


All The World Will Be Your Enemy

by BossToaster (ChaoticReactions)



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Canon Divergence, Everyone is in almost every chapter don't worry your pretty heads about it, Gen, Guess appearances by:, Iverson - Freeform, Nyma - Freeform, RoLo, Shiro (Voltron)-centric, Space Pirates, Wheeeee, pirate shiro
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-16
Updated: 2017-07-31
Packaged: 2018-12-03 01:36:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 35,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11521797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChaoticReactions/pseuds/BossToaster
Summary: All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a Thousand Enemies, and whenever they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you, digger, listener, runner, prince with the swift warning. Be cunning and full of tricks and your people shall never be destroyed.-Richard AdamsShiro escapes the Galra earlier this time, and the Garrison take him away before Keith can break him free.Updates every 3 days.





	1. Prologue: Prince With a Thousand Enemies

**Author's Note:**

> A huge, huge, huge set of thank yous to a few individuals. To [Machidielontheway](http://machidielontheway.tumblr.com/) for the absolutely stunning cover art, and to [Xagrok](http://xagrok.tumblr.com/) for the all the grammatical betaing, and to [Butteredonions](http://butteredonions.tumblr.com/) for tirelessly turning my eager mess into a decent fic.
> 
> Side note: This was written pre-Season 2, so a few plot elements in that won't make an appearance. 
> 
> Side note the second: And the award for the least subtle Stargate reference goes too....!

 

**Prologue**

 

When Shiro woke up, he knew where he was.

The magnitude of that took his breath away.  He spent a solid five minutes just breathing and wrapping his head around the thought.

He couldn’t have said the exact room number, but Shiro knew the area.  He knew this hallway, knew he was in one of the guest quarters at the Garrison.  He knew the sound of the florescent bulbs over his head, knew the feel of the cheap-as-hell sheets under him.

For one moment, Shiro could almost think the events of the previous day - of the previous who knew how long - were just a strange dream.

Then he shifted, and the mechanics in his arm _whirred_.

So much for that.

Sitting up, Shiro took stock of himself.  After they’d knocked him out, he must have been moved straight here.  There was a hint of grit and dust in his hair and over his face.  He had at least been changed out of the dirty jumpsuit he’d found himself in after escaping (from where?) and into medical scrubs.  

For a moment, the clothes threw him for a loop, too. It was polyester blend, which normally wouldn’t make Shiro’s stomach twist in painful glee, and yet here he was, smoothing his hands over it.  Because it was an Earth material.  While he was on Earth.

Shiro was _home._

He’d was dressed in pale, short-sleeved scrubs, showing the lower half of his arms.  Which looked different.  They were both bigger, for one.  His left was _covered_ in crossed lines of gnarled flesh and discolored skin.

Scars.  It looked like he’d been holding a bomb when it went off.  A bomb with claws.

That wasn’t even touching his right arm.

Breath catching, Shiro stood and half-stumbled to the ensuite bathroom.

The face in the mirror wasn’t the one he expected.

Clearly, he hadn’t seen much sun in the past while.  The face in the mirror seemed _older._  From the patch of white hair to the shockingly noticeable scar across his nose, he looked like he’d jumped to nearly 30 years old, rather than the age he thought he was.  In fact, all of him was larger, not just the arm.  These scrubs had to be a size larger than what would have fit him before leaving.

Shiro almost didn’t believe it was him.  But then he moved his hand, and the mirror image followed.  He shivered and reached up, touching the scar across his nose in mute horror.

_Pinned down by something on his arm, something sharp raking across his face as he squirmed, trying to get away.  It was going for his eyes, no no no!  There was a hum from his arm, and a flash of purple light, then-_

Gasping, Shiro shoved himself back from the mirror, hard enough that his back hit the wall.  He slid down it, clutching his hair and shivering.

What was _that?_  

Maybe it had something to do with Voltron?  The name stuck in Shiro’s head like an alarm, driving him to action.

But the name gave no clues what Voltron _was_.  No location, no details.  Just the word.

Taking a deep breath, Shiro stared at the lights and took deep breaths to get himself under control.

“Lieutenant Shirogane?”

Seemed he wasn’t going to get a chance.

Pushing himself up to his feet, Shiro forced his breathing into something more steady.  Then he stepped out of the bathroom.

The person standing at the door was a stranger.  She was small, barely a couple inches over five feet, and she had a no-nonsense look to her that made Shiro’s spine straighten. She was wearing a medical suit, covering all of her to the neck, and the tale-tell glimmer around her face showed she was wearing a projected medical mask.  A shiver down Shiro’s back.

“Hello?”  he asked, hand resting on the bathroom door frame.  The woman’s professional, distant air kept him from coming closer.

“Good morning.  Take a seat,” she told him.  She took a seat on a cheap looking metal chair shoved into the corner of the room nearest the door.  “We have some things to discuss with you.”

Dazed, Shiro sat down on the foot of his bed.  “Are you here to ask me about Voltron?” he asked, chest tight.

The woman glanced up at him.  “Not yet.  That’s not really my area.  I’m Doctor Fraiser.  I want to talk to you about your tests.”

“My-” Shiro cut off and closed his eyes.  They must have done blood tests on him while he was out.  That wasn’t a surprise, not really, but it still made his stomach twist.  The very memory of those bright lights above him, and shadowed figures leaning over, claws on his arm-

Claws?

Shoving the thought away, Shiro took a deep breath and nodded.  “What about them, Doctor?”

Fraiser eyed him for a moment, eyes shadowed.  Was she was hiding sympathy or distrust?  “Your blood tests came back clean.  Unfortunately, that’s not saying much.  We don’t have ways of testing most of the things you could have been exposed to.  But scans of your body showed nothing significantly out of the ordinary, other than the scar tissue and...”  She gestured to the arm rather than speak to it directly.

Despite himself, Shiro curled it closer to him in his lap and reached up with his left hand, covering the ugly, gnarled skin where it met flesh.  “So am I under quarantine?”

“You know the answer to that,” Fraiser replied mercilessly, though her eyes flicked up sympathetically to meet his.  “Same as it would have been returning from Kerberos.  You’ll be under watch for the next several weeks while we make sure there’s nothing that’ll catch.”

That explained the suit and the mask.  Really, Shiro shouldn’t have been surprised.

Shaking his head, Shiro stood.  Fraiser tensed, barely noticeably, and Shiro froze as his chest tightened.  He shouldn’t take it personally.  He was an unknown element to her.  He had battle scars and a metal arm.  That was worth tensing.  It made Shiro tense, and he was attached to it.

But it still hurt anyway.

“We don’t have that long to waste,” Shiro told her, keeping his voice calm.  He couldn’t afford to be called hysterical, not when it would get him sedated again.  He had to _stay calm._  “I need to speak with Commander Iverson.”

Fraiser eyed him, then nodded.  “I’ll tell them you asked for him.  That’s about all I can do.  For now, Lieutenant, try to stay comfortable.  This is procedure.”

Resisting the urge to growl, Shiro shook his head.  “Procedure shouldn’t take precedence over saving humanity.”

“That’s not my call,” Fraiser replied softly.  “I’ll pass it along.  That’s all I can do, like I said.”

Closing his eyes, Shiro nodded.  “Thank you.”  He managed to sound sincere, or at least close to it.

“For now, I’ll leave this information here for you.”  She set down a handful of papers on the table next to her, rather than handing it directly to Shiro.  “Some of this is paperwork for regarding your status as deceased.  Some of it is what to expect from your physical changes.”  She paused, looking him over.  “And, considering some of those wounds, I’ve added extra information on PTSD.  I advise reading all of it.”

Bristling, Shiro looked away.

PTSD.  Wouldn’t that make more sense if he could actually remember what had happened to him?  How could he have post-traumatic stress for something he didn’t remember?

Well, there had been his panicked memory in the bathroom.  Fair enough.

“I’ll speak with you later about more testing.  We have other scans we’d like to do, especially for that arm.  How did you get it?”

Shiro stared down at it, working the fingers one by one.  “I don’t remember.”

Sighing - and this time it was a frustrated sigh, and Shiro suspected she didn’t believe him - Fraiser nodded.  “I’ll be back.”

When she opened the door, the shoulder of someone outside was just visible past the doorframe.  A guard.  

Who were they trying to keep out?

Oh.  No.

It was to keep him in.

He was still swallowing that when the doctor left.

***

Hours passed.

Shiro paced the little room so many times he could walk it with his eyes closed.  He read through the paperwork, or at least tried to, and then searched the room for other things to focus on.  The PTSD packet and the health risks information went completely untouched.

He’d read it after he dealt with Voltron.  Nothing in there would matter if he didn’t get someone to listen.  Voltron was the only thing that could save them.  Shiro _knew_ that, as sure as he knew his name.  

He just didn’t know anything else but a name.

Under the florescent lights, Shiro lost track of time.  He didn’t turn off the light switch.  Somehow, Shiro was surprised when it stayed on.  The room’s lights should have automatically flickered off when it was time to sleep.  

Why?

They never did.  Instead Shiro was left aching and disoriented.  There was no clock in the room, and it had been stripped bare of anything but pure essentials and bolted down furniture.

It was a prisoner’s room.

Shiro told himself he was being sensitive.  It didn’t help.

By now, a day had to have passed since he talked to the doctor.  From how his limbs dragged and his eyelids felt weighed down, he was confident that he’d skipped at least a night’s sleep.

Finally, the door opened, and Iverson stepped in.

Shiro snapped to attention, then froze in place, surprised at himself.  He’d been afraid he’d been gone for ages, considering how much older he looked.  Or the muscle memory drilled into him by the Garrison just stayed true for longer than he would have expected.

“At ease,” Iverson told him, sitting down in the same seat Fraiser had taken.  He was wearing a hazmat bodysuit as well, with the same protective screen over his face.  “How are you, Shiro?”

Despite himself, Shiro relaxed a little.  Iverson had always treated Shiro differently, using a nickname instead of his rank, talking to him instead of talking at him.  When he was in training, it had bothered him deeply.  Iverson picked favorites, and it wasn’t fair.

Now he was just glad someone seemed to be in his corner.

Taking a deep breath, Shiro shrugged.  “As well as I can be, considering.  This is about Voltron, right?”

“Among other things,” Iverson replied, which was basically a no, but he was going to humor Shiro anyway.  Good enough.  “First, I’d like to know where you’ve been.  What happened on Kerberos?”

Shiro swallowed hard.  “I...”  He closed his eyes.  “We arrived as scheduled and disembarked to set up the equipment.  Ma- Cadet Holt and Commander Holt were just finishing up on the first sample when we saw an unidentified vessel.  It caught us.”

After that had been... the alien king.  Leader?  Officer?  Shiro didn’t really remember, just the blur of trying to speak and being smacked down, then dragged along.  The horror of looking around that huge ship and recognizing the scale of what they had stumbled on.

It felt like a memory, but it was so... so strange.  Maybe it had been a dream?  Shiro had no proof one way or another.

“You claim to be abducted,” Iverson repeated, voice utterly without inflection.  “That’s your official story.”

Irritation choked Shiro.  Really?  Was he really going to have to fight for such a basic, rudimentary fact?  Was he going to have to work for each scrap of his story to be believed?  It was a terrifyingly real possibility, and they didn’t have fucking time for that.  “All due respect, sir, but I got the craft I landed in somewhere.”

Miraculously, Iverson didn’t snap at him for that.  Instead the edge of one lip pulled up.  “We have questions about that, too,” he replied, without acknowledgement of the point.  But he wasn’t pushing Shiro to prove aliens were real, either.  It was a concession of a sort.  The kind that saved face.  Iverson was famous for those.

“After that,” Iverson pressed.  “Continue.”

Shiro swallowed.  “I don’t remember,” he admitted.  “I know how that sounds, but I honestly don’t.  All I remember is that the ones that kidnapped me are going to be coming, and they’re looking for Voltron, a weapon.  We need to be prepared for-” For who?

Shiro paused and shivered like a cool breeze had started right behind his neck.  The soldiers when they were captured all had same strange insignia on their armor.  

A name rose in Shiro’s head like a flash of a fish under the surface of a murky lake. “The Galra.  They’re the Galra.”

Leaning back in the chair, Iverson sighed.  “You’re not giving me much to work with, Lieutenant.  You disappear for a year, and come back ranting about aliens and weapons on Earth.  You understand how this sounds, right?”

A year.  He’d been gone a year.

Shivering again, Shiro ducked his head.  “Yes.  But it’s true.  We need to be ready.”

“Voltron.  What kind of weapon is it?”

“I think it’s-”  Shiro closed his eyes, concentrating.  If Voltron was so important, shouldn’t he know why?  “I honestly don’t know, sir.  But it has to be something devastating.”  He met Iverson’s gaze, trying to match Iverson’s stern, steady look.

Iverson took another deep breath, slow and controlled.  “Can you give me _anything_ on Voltron to work with?  I can’t go to the Rear Admiral and say ‘an amnesiac who disappeared in space for a year says we have to go find a ‘Voltron’, but we don’t know what it is, to defend against the Galra, who we don’t know anything about.”

Wincing under the diatribe, Shiro nodded.  “I...”  He closed his eyes tightly, willing his brain to supply the memories.  Anything at all.  Size, shape, location.  Even just a timeframe.  A single detail he could offer in good faith.

He had nothing.

“I’ll try,” he finally offered, meeting Iverson’s gaze, his eyes desperate.  “I’ll cooperate willingly with anything you want.  Just give me a chance to remember.  I don’t know why I can’t remember, but I’ve had fragments of memories come back, I think.  I’ll give you what you need.”

Nodding, Iverson leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees.  “I want to believe you, Shiro.”  And god, the use of his name was cutting Shiro to the bone, hitting him somewhere Iverson had never managed before... before this past year.

(A year?  Only that?  He looked so much older.  Was it just from the scars and hair?  Had the aliens done something to him other than the arm?)

Shiro took a deep, shaky breath.  “I know.  Thank you.  I’ll have more for you soon.”

“Atta boy.”  And it was disgusting, how much Shiro wanted to cling to the words.

But why shouldn’t he?  He was home.  He was at the Galaxy Garrison, which had made him their golden boy.  Shiro had been molded to their standards.  They would believe him.  They had to.  No one else in the world would.

Iverson stood and made for the door.  Frustration seized in his chest as Shiro jumped to his feet.  “Sir,” he called, then waited for Iverson to turn.  “I... My family.  When can I...?”

When Iverson closed his eye, Shiro’s stomach sank.  “Everyone on that mission is still considered dead,” Iverson said.  “At this point, we’re going to wait out your quarantine before we do more.  And until you get that paperwork finished, of course.”

Right. Shiro should have finished that already.  Putting it off had been stupid.  “But, Sir-”

“Shiro, you’re dead to them.”  Iverson’s steely gaze didn’t move an inch, even as Shiro’s heart iced over.  “Let us figure out what we’re doing, here, and make sure the reunion won’t get everyone on Earth killed, by illness or otherwise.  We’ll worry about the rest later.  We need to do this safely.”

“Yes, sir,” Shiro replied, properly chastised.  “How long until the quarantine is over?  I’m not sure how long I’ve been here.”

Iverson eyed him like he wasn’t sure Shiro wasn’t trying to sneak something. “Four more weeks.  You’ve been here two days.”

He left while Shiro’s stomach was still spiralling down to his feet.

***

Every hour that he was in the room and the Galra didn’t attack was like a damnation.

Which was selfish.  Stupidly so.  Shiro didn’t want the Galra to come.  He didn’t want them to attack, to take over, to kill everyone.  Even without his memories Shiro knew, deep in his bones, that the Galra were vicious and unstoppable.  The only thing that could save them was Voltron.

But without any idea of where or what Voltron was, that knowledge was useless.  

Shiro scrubbed his natural hand over his face, staring up at the dark ceiling.  If he could at least get a hint, maybe he could spark something.  Shiro had assumed Voltron was a weapon, but maybe it was some kind of planetary defense system?  Maybe it was something that disabled the ships the Galra would come in?  Or maybe it was a giant space laser?  

What would any of those things be doing on Earth without their knowledge?  What was Voltron doing _here?_

They needed answers, but the answers were all locked up uselessly in Shiro’s head.

Growling to himself, Shiro kicked off the covers and walked into the bathroom.  He yanked off the scrub top and made himself stare down at himself.  Earlier, he’d showered, but he’d spent the time delicately trying not to look, too disturbed and afraid of what had caused the scars.

But last time Shiro had poked at them, it had triggered what was probably a memory.  The fate of the planet depended on this.  He was going to remember, and then the Galaxy Garrison would believe him again, and they’d all survive.

Shiro grit his teeth and began to touch.

The skin was undeniably ugly.  Near all of the wounds had healed badly.  Most of them weren’t lines where he had been neatly stitched together, but instead huge, gnarled patches.  What might have been an electrical burn skipped up his arm.  Shiro’s shoulder and side were marred with near perfect circles that might have been puncture wounds.  One started on his left side, but the matching mark came out his back, like he’d been speared through with a hook.

What the hell had Shiro been up to this year?

This time, there was no flash of memory, nothing so direct.  Instead, Shiro’s left hand shook, too hard for him to keep tracing the scars.  His vision blurred just as every hair on his body stood up.  Suddenly, Shiro was dizzy and his stomach was twisting and everything was tilting to the side he was going to be sick but if he did he was going to choke and he’d die without getting anything done, he’d survived but now he was going to die here they were coming and he couldn’t _stop them no one would listen-_

Shiro came back to himself slowly, curled on the bathroom floor with his forehead pressed to the chilled tiles.  His cheeks were wet.

Maybe it was time to read that packet.

***

Each time Shiro slept, he dreamt.

He woke shuddering and crying out to an empty room.

Nothing he dreamt of was useful.

***

Shiro stared down at the metal arm, brow furrowed as his stomach sank uncomfortably.

This was the heaviest of the available hand weights at sixty pounds, but he was holding it without any kind of strain.  Hell, he was fairly certain he could have picked it up with one finger.

Fraiser bent over her clipboard, scribbling lightning-quick as she looked between Shiro and her read-outs.  Idly, Shiro wondered if the projected mask affected her eyesight.  He’d never actually worn one.  

“Any fatigue?” she asked, still writing furiously.

Resisting the urge to snort, Shiro shook his head. “None.”  When Fraiser nodded to him, he put the weight down and dropped his arm by his sides, waiting for further instructions.

Fraiser finally met his eyes.  “Do you have any idea why you were given the arm?”

Every time Fraiser or Iverson came by, Shiro was asked some variation on this.  Which made sense.  The arm was an unknown alien technology, and they must desperately want to know what it could do and how it worked.  None of the tests had hit any kind of limit.

Something the military was undoubtedly interested in.

Shiro shook his head, looking down at his bare feet.  Since he hadn’t left the room, no one seemed to have thought he needed shoes.  “No.”  At Fraiser’s bland look, he shrugged one shoulder.  “Really, I have nothing.  The only thing I’ve remembered is being hurt.  Fighting.”

“You understand that it’s important for us to know everything we can, right?” Fraiser asked, voice painfully gentle. Shiro nearly flinched back from her.  “If something happened out there, the Garrison will understand.  You won’t be in trouble.”

He couldn’t snap.  He couldn’t yell.  Shiro didn’t dare do anything to make himself even more of a threat.  “I really don’t remember, I swear.  Anything I could say would be pure conjecture.”

Fraiser met his eyes.  “That would be better than nothing.” Something about the tone was like a confession, like she was admitting more than she should have.  “Some possible answers would be more satisfying than none.”

More satisfying to who, exactly?

No, Iverson had admitted it already, when he spoke about reporting to a Rear Admiral.  It probably went higher than that, now.

“Considering what I’ve gotten the impression of,” Shiro replied, slow as he carefully chose each word.  “I think I got injured, and this was a replacement.  I know I was hurt a lot.  Losing an arm would make sense.  It had to be later, since it matches the other one.”  At Fraiser’s confused look, Shiro shrugged.  “I’m bigger than I used to be.”

For a moment, Fraiser tapped her pen on the clipboard, staccato and loud in the otherwise quiet room.  “I can work with that,” she decided.  “We’ll do some more testing.  The scans we got originally were inconclusive.  The metals your arm is made of don’t react to x-ray as well as we’d hoped.  What we did manage to see of the inside doesn’t look like anything we’re familiar with.”

Shiro drummed his natural fingers against the metal forearm, matching Fraiser's nervous rhythm.  “Will you need to open it?” he asked, trying to keep his voice steady.

“Eventually,” Fraiser replied, voice clipped and professional.  But after a moment, she softened.  “Not yet.  We’d like to understand it more before we take that kind of risk.  Scanning it from the outside is still the smartest thing to do.  But the powers that be are nervous of letting you out of your quarantine room.  This hallway is closed down, and we’ve done all we can, but your stay here isn’t exactly regulation.”

If they could break regulation for that, why couldn’t they break it to let Shiro _out?_

Why were they even breaking those regulations?  Why was Shiro still here? This was an academy, not a medical institute or a research facility.

Somehow, Shiro had never questioned being kept here.  The Garrison was the place he knew, and he was so grateful to be home he hadn’t thought twice about it.

Shiro chewed on his bottom lip.  Fraiser was at least somewhat sympathetic, or at least responsive to his emotions.  So maybe she would allow him a little more.

“I assume for those tests I’ll be going out with you in one of the suits?”  Shiro waited for Fraiser’s nod.  “Could we make a slight detour?  I’d like to see outside, if I can.”

Fraiser closed her eyes, sudden and hard.  “I’ll ask for you,” she promised, voice professional.  “I can’t promise.  I’m not sure I even recommend it.  The suits can fail.  But I will ask.”

Last time she’d asked around, Shiro had gotten what he wanted.  It was better than nothing.  So he smiled.  “Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me yet,” Fraiser replied.  “For now, you have more tests to do.  Let’s do one-handed push-ups.  We’ll go until you feel strained, agreed?”

Shiro nodded back, shoulders set and determined.  He’d pass all their tests and then they’d listen to him again.  That was how it _worked._  

***

Waking with a start, Shiro gagged on bile.  His sheets were tangled around him, stuck to his skin from sweat.  He had to kick and buck to get free and tumble out of bed.  Then Shiro scrambled to the bathroom to heave over the toilet.

That had been one of the most cohesive dreams so far.  The background roar had, for once, been accompanied by images.  Now Shiro knew it had been a crowd.

People - aliens - had been watching him fight and be hurt.  And cheered for it.

The horror of that took his breath away and made his stomach twist anew.  He leaned over the bowl again, gagging on phlegm.

Shiro had been in an arena, an honest to god _stage_.  He’d fought a strange, hulking figure with a staff that crackled and hummed like a sci-fi drone.  The crowd had gone wild for the fight, and Shiro had only a single bladed weapon and a deep sense of certainty.  Somehow, he’d stood in that arena and been darkly, viciously glad, because it was better this way than-

Than what?

Once his stomach was done crawling out of his throat, Shiro stood and rinsed out his mouth.  Then he paced.  The chill of the tiles was sharp against his feet, a reminder of where he was, but it wasn’t enough.  He ran his fingers up and down his arms, trying to soothe the gooseflesh.  That wasn’t enough, either.

What was Shiro even doing?  Why was he in a tiny bathroom instead of doing something?

He stormed out and banged on the door.

“I want to speak to Commander Iverson,” Shiro called, voice hard and low.  It was the tone he’d quietly practiced, excited for the day he’d have a team of his own.  When he could be a Commander himself.

Now it got him nothing.

He continued to pound, using the metal arm so he wouldn’t tire or feel pain.  All the while, he fought to catch his breath, but it was beyond Shiro’s control.  Just like everything since Kerberos.

Reaching out, Shiro tried the knob again, just in case, but it didn’t turn at all.  Snarling, Shiro hit the door again, even harder this time. By now he was nearly beating on it.  “I need _out!_  You have to listen to me.  Go get Commander Iverson.”

Nothing.  No response, no footsteps.  There might not have even been anyone outside.

Except Shiro knew better.  There were.  They just weren’t listening to him.  Probably under orders, because he was dangerous and alien now.  Because he couldn’t find the right words to make them finally listen.

Shiro was useless.  He’d fought and he’d escaped and finally, finally gotten back home, and then he’d failed because he’d forgotten everything important.

_“Dammit!”_

Shiro wound back and punched the door.

The wood cracked under the force, showing the reinforcing steel underneath.

Then Shiro’s hand started to _hurt._

He yanked it back, staring down as he bit his lip.  Had he broken something?  Oh god, it _burned_ like electricity, sparking up his arm.  Something inside seemed to be jolting and shifting, and the whole thing lit up like a heated iron brand.  After a moment, something _gave_ , and the pain flared, then died.

The hand still glowed.

Shiro screamed.

***

“Why didn’t you tell us about this?” Iverson snapped, pacing back and forth in the space between Shiro’s bed and the chair Fraiser occupied.  They’d brought in another seat for Iverson, but he hadn’t used it yet.

Shiro shrugged, working the fingers on his hand.  “I didn’t know,” he replied, voice soft.  His every instinct said to duck his head, to straighten his shoulders, to obey the rules until the storm passed.

But it hadn’t helped so far.  “Bullshit!” Iverson snapped.  “You don’t just _forget_ something like that.”

Fraiser opened her mouth like she wanted to say something, then noticed Shiro’s gaze and shut her mouth.  She wasn’t going to cause a scene in front of him, it seemed.

“Sir, I don’t know that I’ve ever done that before,” Shiro replied quickly.  “I’ll be happy to cooperate with any testing-”

Iverson snorted.  “Lieutenant, you certainly will be.  And from now on, cooperation means telling us when your arm is a deadly weapon.”

Biting his tongue, literally, Shiro kept from snapping back.  “Yes, Sir,” he replied instead, and hated the words.  “I’ve been remembering, but slowly.  There’s not much to set off the memories in here, and-”

“Don’t even say it, Lieutenant,” Iverson replied, voice low.  “You do not hide something like this from us and then ask for special treatment.”

Ducking his head, Shiro felt something in his chest crumple.  “Yes, Sir.”

“You will be doing more tests with the arm, and you’ll be the model of obedience when we do scans.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“You will not protest any means of understanding the weapon better.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“You will not cause any more late night disruptions like this.”

“Yes, Sir.”

Finally, Iverson seemed to have vented the worst of his temper.  His expression was still twisted with anger, but at least he was looking at Shiro’s face again.  “This is bigger than you, Shiro.  Try and remember that.”

Guilt stabbed through Shiro, but not in the way Iverson had probably meant for it to.

This was bigger than him, bigger than his arm, and bigger than the Garrison.

Voltron was bigger than everything.

“Yes, Sir,” Shiro replied, his voice hardening.  “And, Sir, about Voltron.”

Iverson’s gaze darkened.  “Have you remembered anything about it?”

“No, Sir.  But-”

Holding up a hand, Iverson shook his head and snorted.  “Then I don’t want to hear a word.”

Frustration bubbled up in Shiro like a fountain of boiling water.   _“Sir,_ one would think if you’re interested in the weapon attached to me, you’d be interested in the other one I have to offer.”

Iverson whirled on him, his eye bright.  “That is dangerously close to insubordination, Lieutenant.”

“Sorry, Sir,” Shiro replied, and didn’t manage an ounce of sincerity.

Scowling, Iverson stared him down.  “You had best think carefully about how you want your time to be here to go.”

And then he stalked out, slamming the door behind him.

Once he was gone, Fraiser sighed and stood.  She looked him over.  “I didn’t believe you,” she replied softly.  “Now I do.”

What had changed her mind?

Meeting her gaze, Shiro took a deep breath.  “Doctor?  Why am I still here?  Why haven’t I been moved?”

Fraiser considered him for a long, long moment.  Then she swallowed and turned, so her back was pointedly facing the security camera.  “Don’t ask me why they’re afraid for you to be seen,” she replied, voice low, barely more than a hiss of breath.  “I won’t be able to answer if you ask why they don’t want you spotted.  Don’t ask me if your paperwork has been misplaced.  Don’t ask me what they intend for you after quarantine is up.”

Gaping at her, Shiro nearly recoiled.  That was... “Those would be dangerous questions.  Why are you telling me this?”

“It would be, if you were asking them, and I was answering,” Fraiser replied, voice hard.  “And I’m warning you from asking those questions because I swore on oath, and the answers would hurt you.”

This was damn near treasonous.  Fraiser could be discharged for less.

But her eyes were clear and her back was straight as she met his eyes.

She knew that, and she was doing it anyway.  Because she couldn’t support this anymore, but there was little else she could do.

Nodding, Shiro ducked his head.  “I appreciate the advice, Doctor.”

“Good.” She nodded to him, back straight, all five-feet nothing of her.  “And I advise you read those packets I left you as well.”

Shiro winced.  He still hadn’t touched them.  For one, it was admitting something, and for another, acknowledging it would give the Garrison another reason to think he was dangerous and shut him down.

“Understood.”

“Have a good evening, Lieutenant.”  With that, Fraiser followed Iverson out, closing the door much more gently behind her.

Once she was gone, Shiro curled up on himself, the pure white bangs brushing against his knees.  His breath came out shaky, like he was on the verge of tears.

Shiro was a prisoner again.  He’d known it, but he’d hoped it had an expiration date.

He was dangerous.  And they were never going to let him out.

***

The sound of footsteps woke Shiro instantly.

Shiro sat up and rubbed over his face.  Were Iverson or Fraiser returning for more of the testing they’d spoken about.

But then there was a shout, and a thud.

Which was just a little different.

Shiro was already untangling himself from the sheets and standing when the door opened. And in it was-

Keith?  The _hell?_

“Shiro!” Keith cried, the relief painfully obvious in his voice.  “We’ve got to go.”

Wait, what?

Shiro stepped closer, turning on the light to see Keith more clearly. The year and a half had aged him, obviously, no longer really a teenager.  But there was that same wildness to his eyes and movements that he’d had when they’d first met.

It all made his eyes burn.  

But Keith wouldn’t appreciate that, wouldn’t want Shiro collapsing all over him and crying.  So he forced himself to keep his hands to himself.  “Go where?”

“Away!” someone replied, voice a whispered hiss, though no more quiet for it.  Shiro’s brow furrowed as he took in three more cadets.  The one speaking was lanky, and stood so close to the large and broad one next to him they were practically touching.  The big one looked like he wanted to be anywhere else.  And there was...

Matt?

No, not Matt.  Matt never had that edge to his face, and was at least a little taller.

Not-Matt stormed forward, reaching for his arm and then freezing when they saw the metal.  “We have to go.  They’ll realize we’re here soon. So c’mon!”

Finally, what they were asking clicked. Shiro took a step back.  “No.  What are you even...?  I’m not going anywhere.  Go back to class.”

There was a pause.

“After all that?” the lanky one yelped, eyes wide.  “We’ve spent days chasing you down, and we saw all that footage!  We knocked out a guard!”  He gestured to the crumpled, unconscious form next to the wall.

“You can’t stay!” Not-Matt snarled, with surprising, sudden venom.  “You can’t just _hide out_ in here.”

“I can’t go back to class,” Keith told him, the same dry, understated tone he always used when Shiro wouldn’t like what he was about to say.  “I dropped out.”

Shiro gaped at them all, overwhelmed.

The big one cleared his throat. “If he doesn’t want to-”

Not-Matt turned on him, already bristled and lips drawn back in a snarl.  When the big one tried to shush him, his voice only got louder. “He doesn’t get a choice!  They’re not going to listen to him, and the rest of the crew are still out there!”  

The words were like a punch in the gut.

Matt and Commander Holt were _still out there._  He hadn’t even been able to get the Garrison to look around on Earth, much less anything more, and Shiro still didn’t remember anything about them.  But all this time he’d just... let it slide.

What was wrong with him?

“Shiro, you need to leave with us,” Keith replied, voice low and painfully, deathly serious.  “Pidge dug up everything.  They’re never going to listen.  There are all these orders coming down the line-”

Lanky’s shoulders fell, and he suddenly looked older.  “They’re right, man.”

Stepping forward, Not-Matt grabbed Shiro’s metal wrist, still glaring.  “It’s the only choice.  They’ll never admit it wasn’t pilot error.”

Even as he stumbled forward, Shiro’s brow furrowed.  “What pilot error?”

Big and Lanky shared a look.  When Big Cadet looked back over, his shoulders were slumped.  “The Kerberos mission.  That’s what they said happened.  Now, stay or go, we need to pick now, because they’re going to find out we got in any second and I really don’t want to be here when that happens.”

“He’s going,” Keith replied, voice hard, but small and far away.  

No, Shiro was far away, knocked out of his body and choking on his own thoughts.

Pilot error.

That didn’t... The three of them hadn’t even been on the ship, how was it supposed to be... the Garrison had to know, they’d been broadcasting their progress, their audio recordings had been transmitted to base...

They had to know that...

That was why.   _That_ was why.

That was why the higher ups refused to move him to another facility.  That was why they didn’t want him moving around the Garrison.  Iverson had built him up, but they’d never, ever meant for him to see the light of day.

Because the second he did, and word got out that he was still around, it would be difficult to deal with.

They’d made him their prisoner, possibly damned the entire planet, just to save face.

Something in Shiro cracked.  Then it went very still.

“I’ll come with you,” he replied, his own voice sounding distant to his ears.  Shiro didn’t fight being tugged, and eventually his feet figured out how to work, and he was running with the rest of them.

It should have been hard to get out.  But Shiro had woken up knowing where he was.  He knew every inch of this place, every hallway and every nook.  Knew the best ways of slipping out for night after night spent on the roof or in the desert, alone or with Keith.

But this time it was different.  This time the walls were hateful, the voices down the hall poisoned.  This time the lights were sinister and the plain corridor oppressive.

Shiro wasn’t sneaking out of his home.  He was escaping his prison.

And he was _never_ going to come back.

***

By the time they were zipping away on a hoverbike, the alarms were already blaring behind them.  Shiro would care about that later.  Then he would care about the fact that these four cadets found him and pulled him out, at the cost of their own careers, that they were going to be in such deep trouble when this was all over.

But instead, Shiro stared up at the starry sky.

“Do you see something?” Broad asked, following Shiro’s gaze up.  “It’s not the aliens, right?”

Without looking away, Shiro shook his head.  “No.  I just haven’t seen this in a long time.”

From the corner of his eye, he saw Not-Matt close his mouth and look away, lips thin.  Likely, Shiro had just accidentally cut off an interrogation before it happened.

Good.  He didn’t want to answer any more questions.  He wanted to watch the stars.

“How are you doing back there?” Keith yelled over the wind as he glanced over his shoulder.  He banked hard, avoiding a rock outcropping, and nearly sent his passengers tumbling to the side.

Lanky snorted.  “We’d be doing better if you’d smooth your ride, dropout!”

But Shiro smiled back, if slightly strained.  “I’m okay.”

Zipping along the desert, stolen from the place he’d trusted with nearly his entire heart, the wind in his hair and the sky open above him, Shiro felt alive.  More alive than he’d been since Kerberos.

This was right.  It was where he should be.  

Though Shiro wished he could have gotten here without dragging these four along.

***

Lance - now Shiro knew his name, because he basically hadn’t shut up for more than five minutes at a time - glanced around Keith’s shack.  “Okay,” Lance drawled, clearly judging.  “Glad you have this little place set up.  You, uh, been here this whole time?”

Glaring, Keith gave a jerky nod.  He stepped to Shiro’s side, just shy of hovering, which was such a role reversal that it nearly made him laugh.

But they were in a tiny shack that Keith had been living in, alone, for who knew how long.  Because he’d dropped out.  The humor of the situation sputtered and died.

Hunk (and Shiro knew his name too, now, also because Lance didn’t shut up) stepped forward to examine whatever Keith had under a flap on his wall.  When he pulled it away, he revealed maps and charts, scribbled over in marker and half-covered in old photos.  Just looking at it made Shiro’s head hurt with unanswered questions.

Pidge wheeled on Shiro.  “So what happened to the rest of the crew?”

God, who the hell was this kid, anyway?  Matt didn’t have a younger brother, just Katie.  Some kind of cousin?  Shiro didn’t know if they’d ever talked about that.  Mostly he’d tried to stay away from extended family talk, because people always wanted him to reciprocate.  

“I don’t know,” Shiro replied, scrubbing his left hand over his face.  “Last thing I remember was getting captured by the Galra, and getting dragged away.  Everything after that is a blur.  I have pieces, but I have no idea what order or what they’re about, or if they’re real.”

Pidge leaned forward, eyes bright.  “You really don’t remember anything?”

Turning around, Hunk tugged the sheet the rest of the way off.  “Dude, Pidge, he said he didn’t.  Don’t be like Iverson.”

But Pidge continued to stare, near feverishly intense, and Shiro resisted the urge to flinch and lean away.  

Instead he changed the subject.  “What are you even- how did you find me?”

Resting a gentle hand on Shiro’s arm, Keith pushed him toward the couch.  “Long story short, I found the crash site.  When I looked into it, I found out about you.”

“We found him skulking around like a raccoon in trash,” Lance snorted, sitting down on the opposite side.  “And then Pidge spilled everything about the Kerberos mission like _that._  Took us months to get so much as a hello.  Go figure.”

Shiro shook his head, closing his eyes.  “So you just... do you understand how serious what you’ve done is?  I should have left you behind.”

“Like hell,” Keith snapped.  “I already dropped out, I’m not staying there for anything.”

Pidge snorted.  “I’ve done worse.”

All of them paused and stared at him.

Frowning, Hunk tilted his head.  “Like what?”

“Well, hacking into Garrison records and transmissions, for one,” Pidge drawled back.  “That’s usually a pretty big deal.”

Lance shrugged.  “Well, we weren’t going to get left behind on this.”

“I could have been left behind,” Hunk muttered, cementing Shiro’s opinion that he was the only one with an ounce of sense.

But Lance just shot him a grin, as though this was all a fun game and not a way to ruin their entire lives.  “You wouldn’t let me n’ Pidge go alone, would you?”

Hunk’s sigh, and the fact that he was here at all, proved that.

“Going back now isn’t going to do us any good,” Keith replied.  “They’ll just want to make us bring them to you, and we’re not doing that.  So you might as well deal with it.”

Shiro didn’t want this responsibility.  He didn’t want to know four cadets had thrown their lives in the gutter for him, or for his knowledge, or just for the adventure of it.

Sighing, he focused on his breathing.

“So this is it?”  Hunk asked.  “Your research?”

Keith nodded.  His hand rested on Shiro’s arm, warm and solid.  Shiro didn’t dare lean into it, not when he was so tightly wound. “Yeah, that’s it,” Keith replied.

“Let me see,” Pidge muttered. He joined Hunk in front of the board.  “Is there a pattern?  I don’t understand how you got the landing site and timing out of this.”

Keith shrugged.  “I just looked at it and it made sense.  It wasn’t an immediate thing.  After months of feeling pulled there, I was kind of beyond questioning it.”

Humming, Hunk tilted his head.  “I recognize this.  Not the drawings, but these readouts.”  He started to murmur to himself, low and thoughtful, and a second later Pidge picked it up and replied.

God, it was exhausting to listen to them.  Or Shiro was just exhausted.  That one beautiful moment of freedom was drained out of him, now that he was under this roof and faced with the consequences.

Movement from the corner of his eye made Shiro flinch. Lance froze with his hand extended.  “Sorry!” Lance replied, voice tight.  “I didn’t mean to- shit, dude, I’m sorry.  Just... you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Shiro replied, instant and automatic.  He wasn’t going to vent to some cadet.  He wasn’t going to vent to anyone.  “Just tired.  What’s this about an energy?”

Keith met his gaze seriously, but his eyes slipped away and tracked over Shiro’s face.  He was probably taking in the changes. Shiro’s stomach twisted into pained knots.  “I think it has something to do with Voltron.  I knew exactly where you’d land, Shiro.  At least, where your ship would.  And exactly when, too.  But you were so close to the Galaxy Garrison, and I nearly got caught when I tried to distract them and get you out.”

Voltron.  Right.  Shiro needed to focus on that.  “You think Voltron is near here?”

“Makes sense, right?” Lance offered, shaking off the awkwardness of before.  “Why else land here?”

Well, Shiro had assumed it was to contact the Garrison.  But then, why not a bigger base?  Why the academy?

Maybe he’d been aiming for something else.

“I can build this,” Hunk said suddenly, then blinked and turned around.  “I can build something to track these readings.  Then we can find more information.  Maybe we can find out exactly where it is?  The cave where Keith found all this might be, like, an instruction manual.”

Shiro leaned back, eyes wide.

Days.  Weeks, even, and he hadn’t gotten so much as an agreement that Voltron was real.  And in an hour outside of the Garrison, they already had a workable plan for finding it.

All that time they could have been preparing, could have been figuring out what to do.

What a stupid, stupid _waste_.

“Let’s do it,” Lance replied, chest stuck out and voice lower, like a movie hero. “What do we have to lose?”

Hunk eyed him for a moment, but then nodded.  “Keith, what supplies do you have?”

With a sigh, Keith got up, but his hand stayed on Shiro’s arm for a moment longer.  “I’m glad you’re back.”

“I’m glad too,” Shiro replied.  It was sincere, but it didn’t ring exactly true.  He wasn’t glad to have spent the past two weeks with the Galaxy Garrison.  He wasn’t glad to have started all this with them.

But he _was_ glad to be with Keith.  He’d missed him.  Seeing him again soothed an ache that Shiro hadn’t even registered.  The circumstances were so wildly different, but Keith was still that fresh, first-year cadet that Shiro was so protective of.  The one on the edge of being great, but threatened by the pressure the Garrison put on its stars.

Maybe Shiro should have remembered that before he’d bowed his head to Iverson, all because he’d used a nice tone.

Glancing up, he took a deep breath.  “Keith, can I-”  Shiro winced at himself.  He was asking _permission_ to go outside and see the sky.  “Nevermind.  I’ll be outside.”

The look Keith shot him was pained.  “Yeah, go for it.  How long do you think this is gunna take, Hunk?”

“Uh, a couple of hours, maybe?”

Pidge snorted.  “We can get it done before dawn with both of us on it.”

Nodding, Keith gestured for them to follow.  “Tell me what you need.”  And they disappeared into another room.

Shiro stood, surprised he didn’t fall over.  His head was so full that it should have been too heavy to lift.  

“You, uh, need company?” Lance asked, looking Shiro over.  His eyes landed on the arm for just a second too long.  If Pidge had hacked the Garrison like he’d claimed, he’d probably seen it activate.  He knew what it was.

The knowledge sent a shiver through Shiro.

So he gave Lance a smile that didn’t reach his eyes.  “I’ll be okay on my own.  You stay inside where it’s warmer.”  It was on the tip of his tongue to tell Lance to head back, to take all of them back with them, but that ship had sailed and they were all going to have to live with it.

Lance nodded slowly.  “Okay.  I’m good with warm.  You enjoy.”

Stepping out, Shiro closed the door carefully behind him.  Then he sat down with his back to the shack and stared up.

He stayed there until his whole body felt chilled to the bone, and until the dust made his scrubs look brown.

Two weeks back on Earth, and Shiro already felt like it wasn’t home anymore.

***

When the voices picked up, Shiro stepped back in.  By then, the sky was just beginning to warm as the sun threatened to rise.  Shiro had officially been up almost all night.  He was so damn tired.

“-so we head out now, and-”  That was Pidge, frowning over the machine in Hunk’s hands.

Hunk frowned.  “Can we at least wait until it’s light out?”

“Give it ten and it will be,” Shiro replied, and all four glanced up at him.

Keith shrugged.  “Alright, we’ll take our packs and head out.  I can take us to where I found the original stuff, and we can figure out where to go from there.  I looked over the entire place and there wasn’t anything deeper.”

Lance shot him a grin.  “You didn’t have my eagle eyes or Hunk’s genius.”

Frowning, Keith bristled and prepared to argue for own diligence, but Shiro put a hand on his shoulder.  No.  Not only was that going to start a useless argument that would waste their time, but Shiro just did not have the patience for it.

Maybe he should have napped instead of watched the stars.  No, he definitely should have.  Now the idea of walking around a desert in the hot sun while he already felt ready to collapse sounded like actual, literal torture.  

This was important information.  If they could figure out what those symbols were saying and find more of them, maybe they could find Voltron.  And they had to before the Galra arrived.  It was already a matter of time.

But it had been two weeks and the Galra still hadn’t shown up.  Could they wait a few hours?

The thoughts were unbelievably selfish.  Shiro could barely believe he was thinking them.  For the good of everyone he needed to suck it up and deal.

Then again, Keith had said he didn’t understand at first.  That he’d stared at the pictures until it clicked.  It was going to take time anyway...

While he was lost in thought, Pidge spoke again.  “This signal is definitely like nothing terrestrial.  I’m not at all sure what it is that Hunk’s device is picking up, other than strange.”  He glanced sideways at Shiro, tone bland but gaze edged.  “I don’t suppose you remember anything about that either, huh?”

The pressure in Shiro broke through.  

“I _don’t remember!”_ he snapped, baring his teeth.  Pidge took a nervous step back, eyes wide at the sudden force of him.  “What do you think, that I just decided to hold back for no damn reason?  Or maybe you think I want something, too?  If I knew anything, I would tell you.  Who the hell even _are_ they to you?”

Shiro was left panting at the end, his metal hand working into a tight fist.  Frustration bubbled and broiled under his skin, tensing his whole body.

Pidge’s face was stricken and fearful.

_Matt stared at him, eyes wide with confused horror.  He was on the ground, and Shiro was crouched over him, face pulled back in a snarl.  Then he dropped the expression.  “Take care of your father.”_

Shit.   _Shit._

Taking a step back, Shiro held up his hands.  “I’m sorry, that was-”

“My father and brother,” Pidge told him, voice shaken.  But his expression hardened.  “They’re my family.”

Shiro’s heart sank.

But then his brain caught up.  The Holts didn’t have another son, they just had Matt and...

And Katie.

Who would look just like Matt if you cut off her hair and stuck glasses on her.

Shiro was an idiot.

“Dude,” Hunk breathed.  “That explains a lot.”

Lance scoffed.  “I’ll say.”

Pidge- _Katie-_ met his eyes, daring him to say more.

And Shiro had done more than enough.   “I’m sorry,” he repeated, eyes closing.  “That was uncalled for.  Completely.”

Taking a deep breath, Pidge eyed him, but nodded.  “I shouldn’t have said that,” she (he?) finally replied, grudgingly.  “I believe you.  It’s just frustrating.”

Shiro just nodded, head still down.

“You guys get ready,” Keith said, hard enough to invite no argument.  “I need to talk to Shiro for a second.”

There was a moment of hesitation, especially from Lance, but then the three of them slipped out into the other room again.  By the time the door closed, Pidge was already getting interrogated by the other two.

Keith put a hand on Shiro’s shoulder and tugged until they were facing each other.  “Are you okay?”

Unable to help it, Shiro snorted.  “I thought I was,” he admitted.  “Maybe not so much.”

“Your hand was shaking,” Keith told him, voice low.  “Do you need something for it?”

Shiro shook his head.  “I don’t think there’s anything to do.  I just need... I need time.  I need to _sleep._  My temper is frayed, and I’m not sure...”  He glanced down at his hand, swallowing hard.  “I don’t think I’m good company right now.”

Frowning, Keith nodded.  “We’ll go.  The four of us will fit better on the bike anyway, and we’ll have a look around with Hunk’s thing and come back.  I’ve been all around that area, and I haven’t found anything extra.  I’m willing to give it a shot, but if Voltron is there, I would have found it.  So let us look, and you sleep.”

They’d all stayed up all night as well.  There was no reason Shiro should need special treatment.

Except that his whole world had turned out to be a lie tonight.  The basis of so much of him was gone. Shiro was a soldier with a military he didn’t believe in.  That he might well _hate._  Who was he, when he wasn’t Lieutenant Shirogane?  Everyone he knew outside of the family he didn’t speak to was in the military.  Hell, even now he was still referring to the others as ‘the cadets’, thinking in terms of their careers, in how he should act as an officer.

Shiro needed to rethink his entire life, his entire basis of who he was.

And _fuck_ , he was so damn tired.

“I shouldn’t,” he repeated, more to himself.  “I should go with you.”

Keith snorted. “Why?  To take pictures and follow around a beeping machine for a few hours?  Because the desert is scary?  I’ve lived here for weeks on my own, I can keep it up for another afternoon. And we both know this place is fine once you’re used to it.”

Shiro shouldn’t.

But he’d also wanted to _hit_ something.

He was better off away from them until he’d calmed down.

“Okay,” Shiro murmured back.  “Just for a few hours.  Be back by noon.  You don’t want to be out at peak Garrison traffic time.  They’ll be looking.”

Keith eyed him blandly.  “I do know how to keep a low profile.  I’ve managed this long.  You’re tired, and you need rest.  You’ll be more help after a few hours of sleep than if you drag yourself out with us.  So rest.”

That all made sense.

And damn Shiro for being a useless jackass, but he was going to accept it.

When he nodded, Keith clapped him on the arm, then started to pack up his corkboard.  “By noon,” he agreed.  “You’ll be safe here.  And when you wash up, I have some old clothes of yours.  I grabbed your stash bag when you left for Kerberos.”

Probably wise.  That wasn’t something Shiro had ever wanted the Garrison to know he had.  It had the keys he’d (illegally) made to the bike bays, the map of the desert he and Keith had drawn up, and an emergency stash of cash, along with the extra outfit.

With one last long look, Keith offered a smile.  Then he stepped out.

Ten minutes later, all of them left.

***

They never came back.  

Instead, there was a roar of an engine, strange and alien and that resonated in Shiro like a drum.  That reminded him of what he couldn’t remember.

When he looked out, he saw a ship.  A ship shaped like a lion, careening through the desert like a paper airplane with a bent wing.  It struggled with itself, and then suddenly straightened and flew off, with a shockwave powerful enough to make Shiro’s ears ring, even from so far away.

Then he changed into the clothes Keith had saved, and spent the next hour putting together an old, barely held together junker of a bike he found in the back.  It turned on, but barely.  The one Keith was using had been much newer, and he must have gotten it to replace this one.  How, Shiro had no idea.  He didn’t want to think about it right now.

But Shiro didn’t need this bike to last long.  Just long enough to search the caves.

Shiro had let the four cadets wander off into the desert, completely alone, nevermind that Keith had survived it for months, nevermind that Shiro had been tired, boo fucking hoo.

Whatever Voltron was, it was a weapon.  And Shiro had let them go searching for it alone.  Who knew what had happened to them?

So Shiro searched.  But he didn’t have a Fraunhofer line emissions detector or a mysterious energy to follow.  He only had a map and desperation.

If they were anywhere in this desert anymore, it wasn’t somewhere Shiro had found.

If they were on that lion ship, who knew where the hell they had gone.

***

Shiro did what he always did when there was nothing else to do: he paced and he tidied.

It lasted him until the evening, when the thoughts of _‘what have you done?’_ wouldn’t leave him alone.

And he stared up at the sky, and he saw a star that didn’t belong.  A moving one, not blinking like a satellite or the ISS.

Shiro didn’t have to guess what that was.

So he locked up Keith’s cabin, taking a few minutes to prep it against the desert.  And he made a plan.

The Galra were here for Voltron.  But if it was the lion, it was gone.

They were probably also looking for Shiro.  So if he wanted them away from Earth, he needed to give them something to chase.

Shiro could be that something.

It was just a matter how.  And Shiro had an idea.  

He was going to leave the way he came.

So he put his stash bag over his shoulder, the copied key for the Garrison garage inside, and he got on that fucking junker of a bike, and he went back the way he’d just sworn he wasn’t going to return.

But, hey, he wasn’t going for long.

Breaking in was painfully easy.  Somehow he had escaped from the Galra.  After that, the Garrison was nothing, especially alone, and especially with the accesses no one had revoked.

And Shiro had knowledge of the building and personnel.  Specifically, where Iverson would keep a top secret alien craft they didn’t want anyone to know about.  His codes and keys didn’t work everywhere, but that was okay.

Locks weren’t much of a problem when he had a hand that could cut through metal.

The ship had survived the landing mostly intact, and the Garrison hadn’t dared take it apart, not when it was their only one.  Not when they probably couldn’t put it together again.

Plugging in the codes for the hangar door, Shiro stepped inside the ship. It turned on at his touch.

And hell if that didn’t feel like a fucking invitation.

So Shiro sent the Garrison one last little message, because he couldn’t resist.

_‘Blame the theft on pilot error.’_

Then, Shiro sent the ship skittering against the ground and out the open hangar door, nearly taking out the wall with him on the way.  But the little vessel was made of tough stuff, and it flew like a dream.  Within a few seconds of being outside of the building it rocketed up, even without building up proper velocity.

As he passed the Galra ship, he sent them a message too.  The words came to him, in a language he didn’t remember knowing.  He was fever bright, buoyed by the sheer stupidity of what he was determined to do.

_‘Catch me and Voltron if you can, you stupid sons of herd animals.’_

The Galra ship was huge, and it was battle ready, and it would destroy Shiro in less than a heartbeat if he was caught.

But first they had to catch him.  And Shiro had one serious advantage over those giant, lumbering warships.

Shiro could _fly._


	2. First They Must Catch You

“How are we looking?”  Shiro asked, eyes narrowed as he piloted his tiny passenger craft to match the Galra transport ship’s speed.  

There was a hum over the comms, and Shiro repressed a sigh.  Just judging by the tone of the noise, it was going to be one of those days.  

“Looking sexy.  Almost effortless.  Like, yeah, there’s effort, but not enough to be uncool.”

Taking a deep breath, Shiro let it out slowly.  “I’m going to hope you’d tell me if something was going wrong, and go with ‘fine’.”

“Aww, don’t be that way, oh Captain my Captain.”

Shiro closed his eyes.  “Matt.  Focus.”

Matt sighed.  “Fine, fine, all shop talk now.  No communications are coming from the ship.  Seems like they haven’t noticed you yet.  Like always, because my modifications are great.  This is where you say thank you, Captain.”

“Thank you, Captain.”

While Matt gasped in mock offense, Shiro activated the magnetic locks of the ship.  It stuck fast to the underside of the Galra ship’s hull.  Then Shiro activated his helmet’s mask.

Time to play.

Popping the hatch of his tiny ship, Shiro pushed his way out.  “Is the shot ready?”

“Son, how long have we been doing this?” Sam asked, voice dry.  “I was ready before you flew out.”

Shiro grinned to himself and pressed his palm to the hull.  The magnets there stuck as well, turning on and off with a twitch of his fingers, letting him navigate the side of the ship.  “Just checking.”

“Dad, you’re not using the right name.”

Rolling his eyes, Shiro huffed out a sigh.  “Sam doesn’t have to call me Captain if I don’t have to call him Commander.”

Matt tsk’ed him.  “You don’t get out of it now.  That’s how you introduced yourself to us, so that’s what you’re gunna get called.”

“Okay, woah there.  First of all, I didn’t know you were in that group.  It’s not my fault you’re too short to be seen over the average Andarian.” Shiro paused his chatter for Matt’s offended huff, well used to it by now.  “Secondly, you’ve never called me by a damn thing I’ve told you to in your entire life, Holt.  And  _ thirdly, _ it was a temporary thing anyway.  I was trying it out.  It’s over now.”

Sam chuckled.  “Well, that’s not true, is it?  Most of the crews we’ve used have called you Captain now.”

The noise Shiro made was definitely not a whine.  He spider-walked from his craft to the ship’s airlock.  “Only because Matt keeps bringing it up!  Look, I’m at the hatch.  Give me thirty seconds for entry then take the shot.”

“Yes, Captain,” Sam replied smartly, and Matt laughed with delight at Shiro’s groan.

Using the Galra hand, Shiro pried open the panel on the outside of the airlock.  Once in, he placed a small device on the mechanics.  It flashed at him for a few seconds, and had there been air, it would have beeped.  Then the airlock opened with a burst of escaping air, and Shiro had to use the magnets in his gloves to hold on or else be blown away.  

Success.  

But an airlock suddenly activating for no reason was definitely going to be noticed.  Which meant it was time for phase two.

“All yours,” Shiro called.  A moment later there was a flash from behind him, where their cloaked ship sat in wait.

A bolt of energy passed straight through the ship’s minimal, low-power shields and crackled over its sides.

When Shiro pushed off the hull and into the airlock, the lights were out.  With a grin, he closed the hatch firmly behind him, then pressed his metal palm to the sensor on the other side.  That door snapped open as well.  Once Shiro was in the ship proper, he continued to float in place as if he was still in the void of space.

“Environmental controls successfully offline,” Shiro reported, and even to his own ears it was a pleased growl.  His lips pulled back into what probably would have been frightening to an outside observer, but Shiro didn’t give a damn. 

Inside, the ship was completely dark, without so much as the light of distant stars as bare illumination.  A tap to the side of Shiro’s head activated the night vision on his visor, casting the world in sharp greens.

Time to go hunting.

The comms were full of chatter, as Sam and Matt compared data and prepared to follow or retrieve Shiro if needed.  That wasn’t going to be necessary.  It hadn’t been when Shiro had spent weeks doing this alone or with other crews, and he hadn’t needed any back-up since finding the Holts and getting them away from the Galra.

Up ahead, the first Galra soldier floated, struggling and kicking ineffectually.  They had a blaster, but it was a few inches from their flailing hands.  They’d probably dropped it out of surprise.  Inside with a proper atmosphere, there was air enough to hear the soldier’s guttural cursing.  But the complete darkness made Shiro invisible.

Keeping quiet, Shiro pushed off the hallway walls, zig-zagging and jumping like he used to in alleys as a teenager, or in the arena.  He was able to get around the Galra’s struggling form without being heard or seen, made easier when they started to shout for help.

Coming up behind them, Shiro grabbed their head in a near-literal steel grip and activated the jets on his boots, just for a moment.  The momentum was enough to push them to one of the walls. Shiro cracked the Galra’s head against it, hard enough to stun, and then again for good measure.  They hung in the air, either unconscious or dead.

Didn’t matter to Shiro.

That was one down out of a total of seven, judging by the craft’s size, but at least one of those would be in the pilot’s seat.  And if he was lucky, Shiro would only hit one or two more.

He continued to bound through the hallways, taking out the soldiers as he found them.  One Shiro grabbed in a headlock and punched into stillness.  The other was knocked out by Shiro’s blaster’s taser setting before they could figure out how to retaliate in zero gravity.

Then he found the vault.

“X marks the spot,” Shiro murmured quietly. His grin stretched his lips almost uncomfortably wide, the same vicious expression as before.  He attached another of the devices he’d used on the airlock.  The console flickered, then went dead.  Shiro yanked the heavy doors open with the strength of his prosthetic.

Time to see what those soldiers had been transporting with such urgency and secrecy.

Floating in, Shiro glanced around.

Crystals.  It was full of crystals.

“Huh.”  Shiro picked one up, twisting it in his hands.  He floated calmly as he examined it, with none of the flailing of the Galra.  That was the problem with the more ‘advanced’ species.  They all took their environmental controls for granted.  No one trained without them, because no one didn’t have them.

Except beings like humans.  Shiro and his crew had spent six months without gravity, and months before that training for it.  But Shiro was very comfortable in zero-G.  All he needed was for the soldiers to panic, even just for a few moments.  Enough time to get the upper hand.

Then brute force took care of the rest.

“Let me see?” Matt asked. Shiro held the crystal up to the scanners in his helmet.  “Huh.  I mean, crystals are nice, but your average synthetic is a dime a dozen.  So what’s got them so- oh.  Oooh.”

Pausing at his tone, Shiro frowned.  Then he shoved the crystal in his bag and started to dump more in.  Clearly this was a good score, if it got Matt all excited.  “What?  What is it?”

“Balmera crystals.  The real deal.  Those things pack a hell of a punch.  They’re all tightly controlled these days.  No one outside of the Galra military is supposed to so much as look at them.”

Sam chuckled.  “Well, if that’s what they want, I suggest we respectfully leave these stolen goods behind.”

Laughing, loud and barked, Shiro picked up the biggest of the bunch.  It was nearly the size of a basketball, and if the grav hadn’t been off it would have been heavy.  “Of course, Commander, let me put this back where I found it.  I promise.”

“Oh, Captain, like we believe that.  You’ve developed some sticky fingers on you since you got out.”

“If they didn’t want me to have sticky fingers, they shouldn’t have made my hand magnetic.”  Shiro smiled gently at Matt’s laugh.  

Matt’s chuckle sounded the same as it had before their capture.  Shiro’s didn’t.  Now it sounded significantly more unhinged.  Shiro knew it.  His view of the world had twisted, coming off its axis altogether.  

But screw it.  That axis hadn’t done him any favors.  It hadn’t helped when it mattered most, hadn’t made anyone listen the second he wasn’t their perfect shining golden boy.  Fuck axises and militaries and the Galra and the whole universe  Shiro had what he needed now, and he didn’t have to bow or kiss ass for it.

So there.

The internal microphone in his helmet picked up a noise.  Shiro paused and stilled, gripping at his find.  The voices of the soldiers grew closer, murmuring and grunting to each other.  From the sound of it, they were colliding uncomfortably as they managed to float down the hall with purpose.

Hm, so they’d adapted enough for that.  Alright.  Time to up the ante.

Pushing off the table, Shiro flattened himself to the floor, crystal held tightly against his side.  The soldiers pushed their way closer, kicking off the walls as they investigated the open vault door.

Once they were directly over him, Shiro closed his eyes tightly and set off the bright light on his wrist brace.  In the otherwise pitch blackness, the light was downright painful.  

“Agh!” One of them groaned.  Grinning, Shiro turned off the light and opened his eyes, just in time to see the one that had screamed was grabbing at their face.  The move jostled the other one, sending them floating jerkily in the opposite direction, back out the door and to the right, not quite close enough to the wall to kick off again.

Resting his back on the floor, Shiro pushed off like he was doing a handspring and kicked the yelling soldier with both feet.  It wasn’t hard enough to do damage, but it was plenty to send them ping-pong balling down the hall.  The move also pushed Shiro into the air, though, and while he was twisting himself back around, the second Galra recovered and grabbed out into the darkness.  He got lucky, fingers gripping Shiro around the neck.  The soldier gave a nasty smile and squeezed painfully hard.  Shiro’s legs kicked, but he wasn’t close enough to the wall to touch off.

For a moment, all Shiro could see was a brightly lit arena and a huge beast of an alien holding him up, squeezing the life out of his neck and chest.  He couldn’t hear Matt and Sam anymore, only the roar of the crowd.  He was helpless without the blade he was given before the match, dangling limply in the air.

Wait.  He did have something he could use.  The weight of it was solid as he held it against his chest.

Shiro took hold of the crystal in both hands and smashed the pointed, jagged top down onto where his attacker’s head should be.

The fighter - no, the Galra soldier -   _ screeched, _ and when Shiro pulled the crystal back, some kind of fluid came off it, beading in the lack of gravity.  Shiro made a face at it, but then activated just one boot’s jet, using that to spin him quickly in place.  At the same time, he activated his right arm and swiped at the soldier’s chest, cutting open their armor and slicing the flesh under it.  Before they could do more than scream, Shiro equalized his spin with a burst from the other foot, then reeled back and  _ punched _ with the still lit fist _. _

The soldier hit the ground with a painful looking thud, then skidded along the floor in a bumpy, awkward roll.  When they slowed to a stop they hung in the air, still and limp.

“Alright, time to go,” Shiro muttered.  He burst both jets and sailed over the probably dead soldier, not bothering to do more than shoulder check the other Galra out of his way.  They cursed and started to follow after him, which meant he had to be fast.  “Sam?”

“Ready as always,” Sam replied easily.  “Check your timer, you should be getting close.”

A twitch of Shiro’s fingers pulled up the display.  Thirty-five ticks left.  “Good call,” he muttered, jetting ahead even faster.  No need to be subtle now, there were still at least four Galra he would have to face if they caught up to him.  He could do it, but probably not without injury.

By the time he got to the airlock again, the counter was down to five, four, three, two-

Shiro aimed his feet to the floor just as his timer hit one and the gravity and lights came back on.  With a muffled curse, he turned off night vision as his whole screen lit up painfully neon green.  Down the hall, there were a few thumps and shouts, barely a bend of the hallway away.

Oh yeah,  _ definitely _ time to go.

Shiro opened the door to the airlock and shut it behind him.  A press of his right palm to the handle melted it to scrap, which he hoped would slow down any pursuers. Shiro didn’t even bother to play nice with the next hatch into open space.  Instead, he jammed his metal hand into the hinges, cutting through in a few seconds.  He heard someone bang on the door, but they wouldn’t dare open it to follow when doing so would decompress the whole ship and send them out into the void.

Turning around, Shiro waved a jaunty goodbye, then flipped them off as he floated out the now open door.

“I can hear you showing off, Captain,” Matt said.  “You had your fun beating them up, just get back to your ship before they realize where you stashed it.”

Still keeping tight hold of his prize, Shiro used his boot jets to get back down to his ship.  The hatch to the cockpit opened automatically for him to settle inside.  The moment it closed back up, the magnets disengaged.  For a moment he hung there, keeping momentum with the ship.  Then Shiro took hold of the controls and shot away.

They were looking for him this time, and the ship was completely back online.  It wasn’t a surprise when his screen lit up in warning of incoming fire.  Shiro rolled, avoiding the first couple shots, but only barely.  The little craft was easy to maneuver but it wasn’t powerful enough to keep this up for long.  “Sam?”

“Just needed a lock.  Firing now.”

There was another flash from their cloaked ship, this time making it shimmer into view.  Laser fire shot out from their gunner’s compartment and hit one of the Galra ship’s cannons.  A moment later, the shields shimmered over the rest of the Galra ship, but that diverted power, meaning the rest of their shots would be fewer and less powerful.

They didn’t need to beat the Galra ship in a fight.  They just needed to get away again.

Grinning, Shiro brought his craft in with a quick spin.  He clipped into place like a motorcycle sidecar against the hull of the  _ Swift Warning. _  A panel on the side pulled open, letting Shiro step out of his little ship and straight into the main vessel just as they engaged FTL flight.

With the artificial gravity engaged, Shiro nearly dropped the larger crystal, but he held fast with the metal arm.  “We clear?”

“Who do you take me for?” Matt called.  “Just because you’re the fancy hot shot pilot doesn’t mean I can’t input basic coordinates to a few hyperspace skips.”

Rolling his eyes, Shiro pulled off his helmet and blinked at the sudden bright lights of reality rather than night vision.  “Nice shot, Sam!” he called.

“All of my shots are nice, but thank you for the compliment,” Sam replied, climbing down the ladder from the bird’s nest.  It was slow going, as one of his legs couldn’t take his weight well.  When he touched down he pulled his cane off the clip on his back.  “Sounds like we got a decent haul today.”

Shiro gave him a wide-eyed look, though his lips pulled up into a vicious grin.  “We didn’t get anything.  You told me to leave it.”  He hid the larger crystal behind his back.

“Oh, my mistake,” Sam replied, completely flat.  “Well, if you happen to find some other, unrelated crystals, maybe we can sell those instead.”

“I’m just glad we gave them hell,” Matt replied easily, stepping out from the bridge.  “Whatever this was about, the Galra were excited about it. Not sure why, exactly, but I looked into it and there’s a ton of chatter from the local Galra ships to that Balmera.  Something’s going down, and if we were an annoyance in that, I’m a happy camper.”

Shiro nodded, lips pulled back until his smile was closer to a snarl.  Matt paused, even after weeks of seeing the expression.  “Agreed.  For now, we should-”

He was cut off by a beeping from the bridge.  Matt trotted back in and tapped on the console.  “Hello,” he drawled, voice suddenly chipper and friendly like a receptionist.  “You’ve reached the office of Captain and Crew.  How can I help you this evening?”

The screen popped up.  Rolo’s face blinked back out at them.  “Office?  You have an  _ office _ now?”

“Yes,” Matt replied instantly.  “Absolutely.  You don’t?  What kind of disreputable organization do you think we are?”

Nyma groaned.  “He’s messing with you, Rolo.  Tell them or screw it.”

The wording of that was odd, so Shiro stepped in, hovering in the background with his arms crossed.  His long coat hung off the back of his chair where he’d left it, so Shiro snagged it and pulled it back on.  

Maybe it was silly.  Certainly, it was a comfort he should have shaken off by now, but it was easier to deal with beings when he was wearing it.  The coat was replacement for the hated Garrison uniforms he never wanted to see again, or the prisoner’s garb they’d all been forced to wear.  When he’d gotten out, he’d needed to feel like someone else other than Lt. Shirogane or Fugitive 117-9875.  

This was the outfit Shiro chose to wear.  If he’d intentionally picked it because it looked like an old fashioned pirate coat, literally no one in the universe needed to know that. 

Well, no one but his current crew.  There was no avoiding that.

“Tell us what?”  Matt asked.  “Do you have a job for us?  What happened to ‘not if you were the last crew in the entire black’, hm?”

Nyma’s face twisted, and she yanked herself away from the camera, grumbling darkly.  Rolo watched her go, more amused than anything.  “Actually, we’ve got something for you and the Captain.  Call it good faith.”

That made Shiro frown darkly.  What would Rolo and Nyma (and Beezer) just  _ give _ them?  Probably something that would earn them retribution if Shiro found out they’d kept to themselves.

There were a couple things that really earned Shiro’s ire.  First were double crossers and those who went crawling to the Galra at the first sign of trouble.  Second were those who went back on their word.

Most theoretically but also most important were those who didn’t tell Shiro if they heard about the blue robot lion the cadets had presumably flown off in.

So far, Rolo and Nyma had fit two of those categories.  Shiro would hate to add them to the third.

Shiro’s chest tightened, and he could see Matt’s eyes get sharper.

“Ooh, I love Secret Santa.  What’d you get us?”  Matt leaned back in his chair, head tilted and smile razor sharp.

Leaning back, Rolo gestured off screen.  “Hey.  Green one.  Pidge?  C’mere.  Let’s see how this works.”

There were footsteps, then a helmeted head pushed into the screen.  They were small and undeniably human-like.

Shiro’s heart stuttered to a complete stop when the green armored person’s mouth fell open.  They pulled off their helmet, revealing familiar brown curls and eyes.  “Matt?”

It was Katie Holt.  


	3. Digger, listener, runner

“Katie?”  Matt breathed.  His hand automatically came up, fingers touching over Katie’s face on the screen as if he could feel her.  “You- Dad!”

The call was unnecessary.  Sam was already there, leaning over Matt’s shoulder.  One hand held onto his cane, and the other gripped Matt’s shoulder tight enough to bunch his shirt.  “Katie, you’re  _ alright.” _

Katie leaned forward, her face nearly mashed into the camera like she was trying to shove her way through it.  "It's really- are you okay?  Where are you?  What happened?"

Stepping into the frame, Shiro smiled at Katie, his heart in his throat.  There weren’t any visible injuries and she seemed in good health.  She was  _ okay. _

Thank god.

Something in Shiro’s chest loosened for the first time in months.  There had always been the fear he'd just missed the cadets in the desert, or they'd been hurt some way, or whatever the lion was had destroyed them.  It was just one more thing that haunted him at night.  That he'd let those four wander off without him. That he'd never know what happened.  That he'd let them walk away to their death.

To see at least one of them alive and well was more of a relief than words could ever say.

Shiro’s throat closed off from relief as Matt nodded.  "Yeah, we're good.  We're- I'll send you coordinates in a second.  We were busted out by this guy."  He jerked his thumb over his shoulder, playfully dismissive.  "Regular jail break.  Katie, what are you doing out here?"

"I came to get you!" Katie replied.  Her eyes finally dragged away from her brother and father.  For a moment she looked in flat confusion.  Then her mouth fell open.  "Shiro?"

"Hey," he greeted, voice rough.  He paused on what to call her.  What was that name she’d been going by? 

Katie took a deep breath, this one ragged.  "You-"  She closed her eyes hard, her bottom lip wobbling.  "Okay, one second."  She tilted her head back.  "Keith!  Hey, someone get Keith!"

Stomach twisting, Shiro leaned forward, eyes heating traitorously.  "He's still with you?  And what about- What about the others?  All four of you are okay?"

"Yeah, we're good," Katie replied.  Her fingers scraped over the odd green helmet.  "We- it's a long story.  Maybe one for when we get to you."

Someone else spoke up just out of sight.  "We can't do that.  Not until we get to Shay and the Balmera."

Katie whirled on the person, her teeth nearly bared.  "No!  That's my dad and brother, we're meeting them first!"  She was ready to throw that helmet at whoever had spoken.

"I'm all for that, but we shouldn't have even stopped for this call!"  The person stepped forward.  It was the bigger of the two cadets Shiro had met that night.  He scrambled for a name, and paused over the memory.  Hunk?  Was that right?  Or was he remembering it wrong?  It was an odd name.  

Smiling into the camera, Hunk (?) gave a little wave.  "Hi.  Really nice to meet you.  Or re-meet you.  Hi, Shiro."

"You're going to the Balmera?" Matt questioned, leaning forward.  "The one in Quadrant Ecticna?"

Rolo frowned from where he'd been pushed half off-camera.  "Yeah, how'd you know?"

"We're nearby," Sam replied.  "We were following Galra chatter.  We can meet you there."  His voice was mostly calm, but there was a desperation in his eyes and in the way he was still holding onto Matt.

"You're here?"  Katie's voice hitched.  "Really?"

"Really really, Katie-bear," Matt replied, voice softer than Shiro had ever heard it.  "We'll see you soon."

There was a bark of laughter, then the other cadet - Lance? - ducked in as well.  "Katie-bear?"

"I'm an older brother, embarrassing nicknames are what I do.  Especially when I haven't seen my little sister in nearly two years."  Matt leaned back into his father's grip.  "We can be there in a few, just as soon as we lose our tail."

"Why do you have a tail?"  Lance asked, the smile falling off his face.

Shiro grinned, sudden and wild.  "We were causing some chaos."

The three on screen all paused, looking wary at his smile.  Rolo’s brows rose, more aware than the rest what it meant.  The expression dropped from Shiro's face.  He was suddenly self-conscious in a way he hadn't been since- well, since the Garrison had locked him down.  Since those four saved him.  

Taking a deep breath, Shiro cleared his throat to get them back on topic.  "You've all been okay?  I had no idea what happened to you,” Shiro asked.

"We didn't know what happened to you, either!" Lance replied, his voice gentling.  "Keith's been freaking out about it.  Don't tell him I said that, he thinks he's all broody and we don't know, but he wanted to go back and get you."

Something in Shiro gave and melted.  "Why didn't you come back?  I get Katie, but why the rest of you?"

Katie frowned.  "We couldn't leave.  There was so much to do and we all had to be here to get all the lions and form Voltron."

Voltron.  The name still sent a burst of adrenaline through Shiro.  It did have something to do with that lion after all.

Wait, lions as in plural?  Why did they need all four cadets for Voltron?

What was going  _ on? _

Frowning, Sam tilted his head.  His hand on Matt’s shoulder twitched like going to reach out again.  His eyes hadn’t left Katie’s face at all, as if he was memorizing all the changes.  "Voltron again.  Just what is a Voltron?"

"Hoo boy," Hunk groaned.  "Yeah, we definitely don't have time to do this now."

"Damn right you don't," Nyma muttered.  "This has gotten way more chaotic than I wanted."

Shiro bared his teeth at her, very nearly a smile.  "Don’t worry, you get something out of it.  I’m going to forget last time we worked together."

"Yeah, yeah, you're very scary," Nyma replied, flapping a hand.  "I'm out of here.  Rolo, fix the ship back up so we can leave already.  If there's going to be more Galra I want to be far away from this quadrant."

Nodding, Rolo pushed up and rolled his shoulders.  "Right."

"I knew that was faked!" Hunk burst out, hands balling up to his chest.  He nearly hopped in place.  "I just knew it!  There was no damage when your coolant blew, and there definitely should have-"

"Shiro?"

Suddenly Shiro understood why the collective Holts had tried to ram into the camera like birds against clear glass.  "Keith?"

"Uh oh."  Lance ducked out of the way just in time for Keith to barrel through.  He slammed hands braced on the console and looked at them, eyes wide.   

He looked-

Keith was alive.  He was in one piece.  He was  _ so close. _

Shiro’s hands twitched to reach out and touch, to reassure himself that Keith was really okay.

"Hey, Keith," Shiro murmured, voice softening.  "Good to see you."

"Good to have you back."

Neither said anything else.  Just smiled.  Shiro didn’t need more - right now he just needed to see Keith.

"Okay, here," Matt said.  "We can head your way in a bit.  Our tail is just a little transport ship, so it’s not going to be able to follow us that well.  There's a ton of Galra chaos at the Balmera.  No one is going to even look for us in that direction right now.  It'd be suicide for us."  He paused and made a face.  "It's still kind of suicide.  Is there someplace not quite on the Balmera that we can land?"

"You can meet us on board," someone else replied.  It was a higher pitched, accented voice - Shiro would have said feminine, except that was a terrible category when it came to space.  "How large is your craft?"

"A little five person thing," Matt replied.  "About twenty yards?  Uh, fifteen brixins."

Katie's brows jumped up and her shoulders tightened, deeply uncomfortable at the Galran words in Matt's mouth.  "That'll fit in the castle’s hangar, right?"

"Absolutely," the voice replied.  "We have the landing bay that's not in use at the moment.  They can meet us there.  We'll keep cloaked and avoid detection until we're ready to attack."

Sam held up a finger.  "I'm sorry, attack what?"

Smiling into the camera like a shark, Katie raised her head.  "We're going to attack the Balmera."

***

Shiro sat in the pilot's chair, taking deep breaths.  Matt paced back in forth in their tiny cockpit.  He ran his hands through his hair, tugging on the curls as he moved from Shiro's seat to Sam's and then back, about seven feet total.  "I just don't understand."

"None of us do," Shiro agreed, leaning back.  He glanced at Sam, raising his brows dryly.  Matt had repeated himself at least three times by now, and he was no closer to calming down.  Sam, on the other hand, had sat down and was calm for the moment.  That might change when they got closer to the Balmera, but for now he seemed to have settled into something like a zen state.

Not for the first time, Shiro admired how composed Sam was in bad situations.  It was a trait he hoped he'd shared during his year of captivity.

Matt made a nasal sound of frustration.  "Fighting a Balmera.  How are they going to fight the Balmera?"

"I believe the idea is to fight the Galra on the Balmera," Sam replied.  "Much less nebulous a target."

Whirling on him, Matt spread his arms.  "The four of them?  Four little cadets against an entire Galra fleet?  We've heard the chatter, there's a ton of ships there.  Not to mention all the defenses they'll have.  A Balmera is a mining planet, essentially, so they're going to have anti-aircraft turrets and foot soldiers and god knows what else!"

Sam's brows rose.  "All true.  Also, you're still a cadet."

That earned him a flat look.  "In rank only.  I'm not like them.  What do they know about what they're getting into?  We didn't know, and we were older than they are!"

"Matt," Shiro called, holding his hands up.  "You said it yourself, we don't know what they're talking about.  Maybe they know something we don't.  Like a weapon.  Whatever Voltron is.  It has to be that lion, right?  It left right before the Galra showed up on Earth."

Why would aliens make Voltron into the shape of an earth lion?  What could the blue lion do?  And what was with that armor, and the mysterious extra person they were with?

It was all baffling.

"Maybe?"  Matt groaned and sat down heavily in his own seat, still nearly tugging his hair out of his scalp.  "Do you remember anything about it?  I know you'd say but- hell, Shiro, I have to ask."

"Nothing," Shiro admitted, running his hand through his bangs.  "Just that the Galra were coming for it, and they couldn't have it.  No matter what.  I haven’t remembered anything else.  Hell, I might not ever have known more.  I’ve asked everyone since I left Earth again. Nothing’s ever turned up."

Sam frowned.  "It certainly sounds like a weapon.  I admit I don't like Katie being involved with this, but she's a smart girl.  She knows how to avoid bad situations."

"Does she?  Even if she's all alone in space?" Matt snapped back.  "Or if it's a fun puzzle?  Are we sure?"

"I choose to believe that until we know more," Sam shot back.  "I choose to have faith in your sister.  And I choose to not work myself into a useless lather until I know more.  The same way I chose to keep hope and keep my head down until an opportunity arose back at the camps."  He nodded to Shiro.  "That worked out."

Matt snorted darkly and crossed his arms, scowling at his father.  "Yeah, well, it's all well and good when the universe comes together all nicey-nice.  Except the parts where it sucks and it's full of awful killer aliens and the worst scum of the universe."

Shiro's lips quirked.  "Should I make the Tatooine joke?"

Eyes narrowed, Matt scowled at him.  "And why are you so calm?  You were beside yourself trying to figure out anything about that Voltron thing, and now you're all calm too?  Am I the only one reacting appropriately to this situation?"

Settling back in his chair, Shiro steepled his fingers.  The position made Matt snort, but Shiro ignored it.  Yes, combined with the jacket the posture was like a very corny pirate movie.  They had bigger problems right now.  "We don't know anything.  It's possible Voltron is just... something that messes with Galra.  They'd be desperate for that.  Or some sort of defensive weapon.  It could be anything.  Am I thrilled that the four cadets who saved me ran off and got wrapped up in all this?  Absolutely not.  Would I rather they be back in the Garrison doing homework?  Yes!  But I gave up on that happening when they sprung me, and now they're here already.  We can't exactly barge in and demand they let us make the decisions for them."

Matt's jaw set mulishly.  "We can if they made bad choices."

"They're here, they're wrapped up in it, and the best thing we can do is understand what happened and help them out,” Shiro replied.  “If it turns out they're getting tangled in something bad, then we let them see what’s happening.  They're smart.  They got accepted into the Garrison in the first place.  And Katie is a Holt.  You've all got good noses for sniffing out trouble."

That finally calmed Matt, if only a little.  He nodded, lips curled up just slightly.  "Yeah, we do.  And Katie doesn't take any bullshit.  She hates being fed lines."

Considering her response to the 'pilot error' report had been to sneak into the Garrison posing as a student and then to break out a prisoner, that was clearly true.

"Besides, I think you have better things to talk about.  The whole..."  Shiro frowned, pausing.  "Posing as a student thing.  Which meant she had to falsify a truly impressive amount of documents."

Matt grinned.  "Yeah, she did."

Sam groaned.  "Yes, she did."

Leaning back and setting his feet on the console, Matt stretched his arms over his head.  "I'm going to tease the hell out of her for that.  It's going to be good.  Once we head home."

"Don't get ahead of yourself," Sam warned quietly.

Matt frowned.  "Why the hell wouldn't we go home?  We found Katie, she found us, everyone meets their Holt quota, we go catch up with Mom and give the Garrison hell.  End of story."

"If she's wrapped up with that Voltron thing, whatever it is, it can't go back to Earth."  Shiro closed his eyes and took a deep breath.  "It really can't.  They'd destroy Earth to get to Voltron."

Matt made a careless noise.  "Not if they don’t know we were here.  We leave and forget about Voltron and lions.  Nothing to do with us."

"But the Galra can't get Voltron either."

"Picky, picky," Matt muttered.  "Whatever.  We wait and see.  But I don't know why we can't just pick Katie up like a drive-thru kids’ meal and wave goodbye before all this nonsense goes down."

Sam glanced over at Shiro.  Shiro nodded back.

Matt might think that, but the universe rarely worked out so neatly. 

"Well," Shiro replied.  "We'll see. I'll be glad when we can check the four of them over."

"You're going to have your shadow back," Matt cooed, a sarcastic bite to his words.  "A little duckling back with his Mama.  Aww.  Precious."

Shiro rolled his eyes.  "Don't be ridiculous."

"I'm not being ridiculous.  When we started training I almost didn't recognize you without your favorite freshman a half step behind you."

"Seriously, enough.  I got enough of this on the way to Kerberos, I don't need it while flying to a Balmera."  Shiro turned his chair away from Matt, ignoring his fluttering lashes and gushy faces.  “We’ll be coming out of hyperspace in thirty ticks.”

Matt huffed but obligingly focused, turning to his own station.  “Alright, setting up the castle’s frequency.”  He crinkled his nose.  “Castle.  Kind of an arrogant name, isn’t it?  It’s what I’d expect a Commander ship to be called.”

“Maybe it’s a reference to something,” Sam pointed out easily. “Like, say, the  _ Daedelus.” _

Humming noncommittally, Matt’s fingers flew over his controls.  “Alright, we’re cloaked and ready.  How close are you dropping us in?”

“Half an Astronomical Unit away,” Shiro replied.  “I don’t want to be close enough for any Galra to detect our entrance.  Taxing over the old-fashioned way is better than getting shot out of the sky because someone happened to be looking the right way.”

Sam tapped his cane against the floor, a nervous, staccato rhythm.  “Agreed.  Whatever this meeting is, I want it to go as smooth as possible.”

“Paranoid,” Matt sing-songed.  “No one’s detected us yet.” But he didn’t protest outside of that, proof enough that he approved.

They were about to meet up with their loved ones, after all.  No one wanted to jeopardize that, even if it meant delaying the reunion by a few minutes.

Raising a hand as signal to brace, Shiro came out of hyperspace.  They jerked, the ship’s ancient inertia dampeners straining.  Sam pressed his cane to the base of the console, using it to help keep his balance.

This far away they couldn’t see the Balmera, much less a ship nearby.  But Matt started to tap on the console again, and soon a screen projected over the front of the cockpit.  “Hello?  This is the  _ Swift Warning. _  Do you copy?”

There was a pause, and then the screen was suddenly completely filled with someone’s face.  Their eyes were nearly human, except for the unnaturally bright colors of the iris and over the pupil, and the two triangles of blue at the corners of their cheeks.  They sported both eyebrows and a mustache, unusual in the wider galaxy, both in the same shockingly brilliant orange.  “Oh, apologies.”  They pushed back enough to reveal more of their face.

It wasn't the first time Shiro had been surprised by how often alien species followed the same basic structure as humans.  Most were bipedal with two arms and a head, and maybe some kind of head decoration.  There were exceptions, obviously. Matt, at least, remembered one fellow prisoner who had eight sets of arms and a long, tube-like body like a ferret.  

Shiro still didn't recall at all.  But they'd all gotten used to his memory blanks, by this point.

Still, seeing the alien in full was shocking.  With a hat and a touch of makeup at the corner of their eyes, the alien could have walked around on Earth without a second glance.  Well, alright, they might have stood out a little.  Most middle aged humans didn’t have dyed orange hair.  But otherwise?  

That couldn't be statistically probable, and yet here they were.

"There you are!" the alien greeted cheerfully.  The translators picked up the language, but more accented than Shiro was used to hearing.  Something unusual, then, but still known.  "My, you two do look like our Number Four, don't you?"

Matt narrowed his eyes.  "Katie?  You refer to them by number?"

"Not always," someone else replied.  It was the same voice as before, and this time they stepped properly into view.  They were nearly human as well, though darker skinned and with pure white hair.  "Only when he’s being light-hearted.  It's wonderful to meet you three.  We've heard so much."

Sam offered a polite smile.  "That's nice to hear, though it makes me worry."

Nodding, Matt grinned.  "I feel like I should vet all those stories."

The dress-wearing alien smiled, their hands folded in front of them.  "We'll be sure to catch up.  But first I'm sure you'd like to have your reunion.  Coran is sending you the coordinates now.  Welcome to the Castle of Lions."

Matt nodded as his screen lit up, and Shiro adjusted course accordingly.  The small dot in the distance that was the Balmera began to grow, becoming a nearly radioactive yellow, with huge spines coming off of it.  

As they approached, they saw another speck appear, this one a bright shining white in the light of the closest star.

It was a ship.  But, true to it's name, it was literally shaped like a castle.

And it was gorgeous.  Made of all sleek lines and bright blue stripes of light, it lit up the area around in like a halo.  As they got closer, the raised spires and intricate detailing came into focus.  Sam took an audible breath in.  The castle was a grand mixture of architecture and functional ship design.  

Slowly, Shiro flew them in closer, dragging his eyes away from the graceful lines to focus in on the landing vector.  As they approached, a panel lifted up and then were able to settle into a hanger in front of four small, armored shapes.

"Ready?" Shiro asked, smiling at the other two.

Matt shoved his way out of his seat, eyes suspiciously bright.  "Yeah," he replied, hand shaking as he braced it on his chair.  "Need a hand, Dad?"

"I think not," Sam replied, though he was leaning heavily on his cane as they started for the hatch.

The ramp barely had time to lower before Katie Holt burst from the ranks, a blur of green and white.  She launched herself at her family, one arm around each shoulder.  Sam nearly buckled under her weight, but Matt shifted to take more of it on himself and soon they were a huddled mess of exclamations and hugs.

Something complicated twisted in Shiro’s stomach, a sort of wistful sickness.  He was thrilled for them and ecstatic that Katie and the others were okay.  They deserved this reunion so much, and Shiro would have moved all the suns in the universe to get them here together, especially if he could bring in Dr. Holt for them.

But it was also the end of a part of their lives, just like every time Shiro had disbanded a crew.  When he was alone and untethered again.  Safe, but solitary.

Swallowing that, Shiro still smiled.

The Holts were together.  They were family.

And Shiro had someone of his own to meet.

Turning back to the other three, Shiro held out his hand.  "Keith."

Like that was the signal he'd been waiting for, Keith sprinted over and grabbed hold of Shiro's hand, dragging it closer.  Keith pressed their chests together and wrapped his arm around Shiro's back, just as Shiro latched on as well.

"I'm glad you're okay," Shiro murmured to him.  The words were utterly inadequate for the way his stomach shivered with relief, for the way Shiro was faint-headed with the knowledge that they were all okay.  That he hadn't gotten them killed with negligence, or gave up too fast and left them all to die of dehydration somewhere in the desert.  

But Keith didn't need words.  Never had.  That was part of why their friendship worked.  Instead, he squeezed Shiro's trapped hand in his.  "You too.  I'm sorry we left."

There was a wealth of history in those four little words.  Rather than pick it apart, Shiro just smiled at him and stepped back.  "I left first," he replied softly.  "Now we're even."

Something wobbled in Keith's expression, but he nodded and offered a small, soft smile.  "Yeah.  We are."

Clearing his throat, Lance stepped forward and offered his hand, now that Shiro and Keith were untangled.  "Hi there.  Good to see you again.  Nice coat."

Shiro shook back, pleased when Lance didn't seem bothered by Shiro's right hand.  Then again, he'd had his chance to get used to it months ago.  "You too.  Thank you again for helping me, last time."

"No problem," Lance replied, grinning widely.   "Didn't stay put very well, did you?" There was a hint of a hero-worship shine to his eyes that hadn’t been there the first night.  Or maybe it had been.  Honestly, Shiro's memory of that night was a blur.  He'd been exhausted and frazzled, riding on fumes and nothing else. 

"In a desert shack without any supplies?" Hunk muttered.  "Are we really surprised?"

Keith frowned and turned around.  "There were supplies.  I was living there, of course there were."

Brows up, Hunk tilted his head.  "Enough for how long?"

"A few days?"  Keith shook off his irritation as he turned to look at Shiro. "At least you didn't have to go back to the Garrison.  That's what I was worried about."

Shiro snorted.  "Well, I did.  But it was to steal back the escape craft I landed in.  And then fly it.  Very far away."

Now the look in Lance's eyes was definitely hero worship.  "You stole it back and flew it?  What'd the Garrison say?"

"Nothing that I had to listen to," Shiro replied.  "I had keys, still, and they never bother to change the main hangar passcodes.  Anything else I just..."  He mimed striking with his metal arm.  "Took care of.  Besides, someone had to do something.  The Galra finally showed up about a half a day after you left, and I figured giving them something to chase was the best way of drawing them away."

"You outran a Galra flagship in an  _ escape pod?"  _ Lance asked, eyes widening further.

"It took them like five minutes to turn around that giant thing," Shiro replied, but he grinned under Lance's unabashed admiration.  Really, it was fun to have someone compliment him on his piloting.  Matt and Sam were far too used to his flying, and he didn't get the chance to show it off much anymore.  These days, when people were interested in his skills, it was for how he could fight.

Shiro didn't like that one as much.

The door to the hanger opened, and the two aliens from the brief hailing walked in.  Up close, it was clear they had some impressive resources.  They were dressed immaculately, the outfits elaborately decorated and in bold colors - not something the average foot soldier showed up wearing on the daily.

Then again, clearly they were somehow important, since they lived in a goddamn castle-ship.

“Welcome,” greeted the white-haired alien, giving a quick bow of their head.  “It’s an honor to finally meet you.”

Shiro glanced back, because polite introductions were usually Sam’s territory these days. But Sam was in the process of running his hands over every inch of Katie that wasn’t covered in armor, while Matt hovered over them both.  

Up to Shiro, then.

Oh boy.

“You as well,” Shiro replied carefully.  He reached out and put a hand on Keith’s shoulder, just a touch territorial.  While he’d waved Matt’s words off, now they echoed in his head.  Just what had the aliens told these cadets to make them stay and search for the Voltron weapon?  

Well, let this have been some kind of manipulation. So far it seemed there were only these two aliens on this whole ship.  Shiro and the Holts were already inside and had these two outnumbered.  If they had been using and manipulating these four cadets, Shiro had no problems commandeering their castle.  

Hm.  What kind of price he could get for it as a whole?  Or would be better to break it into parts and sell that?

Shaking off the thoughts for now, Shiro offered his hand - the left, this time, because it seemed more proper to use his natural hand for something like this.  “I’m Takashi Shirogane.  Nice to meet you.”

The white-haired alien reached out and took his hand.  At first their grip was tentative, but it strengthened to an impressive degree as they shook.  “I am Princess Allura of Altea, and this is Coran, my advisor.”

Shiro’s smile froze.

Princess.  

The title dropped like a stone in his stomach, weighing all of him down.  Suddenly, Shiro wanted to step back and he nearly wiped his hand off on his jacket.

Another honorific for the list, like Emperor or Commander.  All useless titles that did nothing but cage Shiro in.  Anyone with one wasn’t to be trusted.

Shiro’s skin still prickled with the desire to get out of Allura’s range, to not be in her domain and under her jurisdiction.   

Finally dropping her hand, Shiro nodded absently.  “Okay.”  It was an awkward response, but Shiro didn’t have a better one outside of immediately throwing the title in her face.  “Altea.  Haven’t heard of it.”

Immediately,  _ Princess _ Allura’s eyes hardened.  “The Galra made sure of that.”

Whoo boy.

For a moment, Shiro could almost sympathize.  He knew what it was like to have his world unmade by the Galra, if in a more metaphorical sense.

But Shiro still didn’t want to be near her, much less empathizing.  So instead he just nodded his understanding.  “It sounds like there’s a lot we need to be caught up on.  But we might need a few minutes.”

Allura nodded, looking over Shiro’s shoulder at the Holts.  “Agreed.”

Back next to Lance, Hunk shifted uncomfortably, nodding reluctantly.  “It should be the short version, though.  The full story can be later.  We really can’t wait.  Shay needs us.”

“Shay?” Shiro asked.

Hunk nodded, shoulders straightening.  He looked much taller, and Shiro realized belatedly he’d been slouching.  “One of the Balmerans.  A friend.  One I admire very much.  She helped us out and got in big trouble with the Galra for it.  We  _ have _ to help her.”

It was such a startling change from the nervous version of Hunk who had only reluctantly left the Garrison because Lance was going along.  The change wasn’t a bad one, but what had Hunk seen to bring this out in him?

“That’s why you want to fight a Galra fleet?” Shiro clarified.

Keith nodded.  “The Galra are killing the Balmera.  We’re going to save it and those people.”

Somehow, the explanation unknotted the muscles in Shiro’s shoulders.  So these two aliens hadn’t just pointed the cadets at the Balmera and said ‘Them.  Fight all that.  For Voltron.’  That it was for an understandable, even  _ noble _ reason was comforting.

Not that it wasn’t still a crazy thing to do, but crazy had a charm to it.  After all, Shiro’s plans were regularly off the wall too.  

“I don’t know what the  _ Swift Warning _ can do to help, but we’ll do our best,” Shiro replied, nodding to them.  He clapped Hunk on the shoulder and got a surprisingly bright smile in return.  Now that someone was listening and agreeing that this was important, Hunk relaxed.

Allura’s gaze narrowed, nearly calculating.  She looked him over.  Shiro fought the urge to put someone between himself and her eyes.  

“Actually,” she said.  “I think there is something you can do.”


	4. Prince with the Swift Warning

There were no bugs in open space.

Shiro was at least 98 percent sure of that.  The environment was inhospitable to them, and most ships had decontamination features specifically designed to prevent any species from crossing over into new planets.  Once upon a time, accidental introduction of otherwise harmless creatures had probably caused untold environmental disasters.

Yet something was  _ bothering _ Shiro.

It was like a mosquito, tugging his attention with an incessant buzz, except no amount of swatting stopped it.  Shiro had tried a couple of times, but it didn’t make a difference.  Worse, it didn’t stay the same pitch. If it was just a single drawn out whine, he could have ignored it until it was white noise.  But this changed, demanding his attention.

It was, frankly, really damn annoying.

Rubbing over one ear, Shiro leaned back in his chair.  They’d all been ushered into some kind of meeting room near the hangars and settled at the tables.  Then the paladins -  _ paladins, _ like some kind of knights of yore - gave the short version of what happened since they’d left Earth.

Being transported a galaxy away.  Awakening two members of an otherwise extinct species from a ten thousand year old slumber.  Discovering they could only bond with three of the lions, and so long as the other remained in Galra custody, they couldn’t free the fifth.  Fleeing Arus, and watching it be destroyed.

Months of a dangerous cat and mouse game, where the ship with the other lion pursued them endlessly around the universe to destroy them.

Months of training like soldiers, of learning to fight and tasting defeat, of nearly being shot out of the black.  

Months of not even knowing if Keith could work with this fourth lion, of knowing Allura would step up for the final one if they could just get it out.

“Last time Sendak caught up, we completely blew out the castle’s old crystal defending and escaping,” Hunk said.  “Which is why Coran and I went to the Balmera in the first place.  Shay helped us get a new one, and she got captured for her trouble.  Which is why we  _ have _ to go help her.”

Coran sighed.  “And now Sendak’s ship has been detected over the Balmera.”

The four cadets - the four  _ paladins _ \- burst into noise, nearly covering Matt’s hissed intake of breath.  Shiro glanced at him, confused, but the rest of the conversation immediately drew him back in.

“We can’t fight him again!” Katie groaned, shaking her head.  “Last time he nearly destroyed the castle.  The Balmera isn’t going to be able to spit out another crystal in this state.”

“We have to!” Hunk replied, his eyes growing frantic.  He clutched at the edge of the table so hard that it threatened to break.  “We can’t just leave the Balmerans to die.  Not after they helped us!”

Keith frowned.  “We let Arus get attacked,” he pointed out, a well of bitterness to his voice.  “Same thing applies here.  We decided keeping the lions from the Galra was most important.  Are we going back on that?”

Swallowing hard, Lance glanced between the Alteans and the other paladins.  “Can we try?  At least, I don’t know, land the lions and try to get some of them out?  We can find them a safe place.”

“And leave the Balmera to die,” Keith finished grimly.  

“You have a better idea, Mullet?” Lance snapped back, bristling.

Keith frowned.  “I’m just saying.”

Lance looked ready to keep arguing, so Shiro cleared his throat.  The buzzing got louder, but he ignored it as best he could.  “Okay, so, you can’t do a frontal assault.  Lance’s idea is good - do we have anything else we can do that isn’t just straight out attacking?”

Across the table, Matt eyed Shiro blandly and mouthed ‘we?’.  He and Sam had Katie bracketed on either side like they were prepared to lean in and pull her close at any moment.  

Shiro only shrugged back, the movement small and subtle.  It was a turn of phrase.  Besides, it wasn’t like they were going to just _ leave  _ the cadets here to fight _. _  The three of them weren’t leaving unless the other humans were, and that didn’t sound likely.

“Actually,” Allura replied, hands folded in front of her.  “I think we might be able to do both.”

Frowning, Sam leaned in closer to Katie.  “You want to attack a Galra commander’s ship?”

“Yes, but not now,” Allura replied.  Her eyes were bright and she was slowly starting to smile.  She made an impressive sight, only tarnished by that damn circlet.  “Not until we have Voltron.”  Glancing between Shiro, Sam and Matt, she inclined your head.  “Judging by what you’ve said, along with your contacts and your ship, I assume you do... less reputable work.”

Maybe it was that pause.  Maybe it was the accent that gave Allura had a tone.  Either way, Shiro immediately bristled.  “We do a good job at what we do,” he replied, voice sharpening.  His fingers dug into the armrests.  The metal gave under the force of his right hand.

“I’m sure you do,” Allura replied quickly, airly.   _ Dismissive, _ to Shiro.  “It’s simply an observation.”

Leaning back harder in his chair, Shiro’s chin rose up defiantly.  “What’s your point?”  It came out harsh, the vocal equivalent of baring his teeth.

Next to the Princess, Coran bristled right back.  “I advise you watch your tone with the Princess.”

Coran’s words were like a pick-axe smacking down over a frozen lake, spider web cracks spreading wide through his composure and threatening to send Shiro tumbling into the churning, dark depths.

Something of that must have shown through his face, because there was an uncomfortable shift around the table.  Matt was preparing for a fight if need be, and Sam’s lips were pressed thin.  The paladins were unsure at the display, or, in Keith’s case, outright concerned.

But before Shiro could respond, Allura held up her hand - thankfully not to stop Shiro, which would have shattered him the rest of the way, but to Coran. 

“My point,” Allura continued, voice raising, “is that you specialize in getting to valuables.  And Sendak has something very valuable indeed.”

Shiro thumped back in his seat, his temper releasing as Allura’s plan became clear.  “You want us to steal that lion?”

Allura folded her hands in front of her again as her shoulders relaxed.  “Yes.”

Huh.  Shiro had been making her uncomfortable.  Iverson hadn’t ever seemed nervous of his temper, and he couldn’t imagine his Galra captors had cared if he raged.

That should have been a balm.  The Princess was an authority figure through nothing but her birth.  Putting her off balance was the only way Shiro had of evening the playing ground, especially while he was in her domain.  This wasn’t his ship anymore, and here Allura had final say.  Like the Garrison and the Arena, this space belonged to someone else, someone who could hold their authority against him.  It stripped him of the power he’d managed to build for himself.

But Shiro still tasted shame like bile.  Allura was a princess and an authority figure, true, but she was someone who hadn’t harmed him directly, at least not yet.  

So Shiro let out a gust of breath to control himself.  This was a job.  One that would piss the Galra off like nothing else.

“Okay,” Shiro finally replied, tone much more even.  “Interesting.  I think- I think we can do that.”

“Slow down there, Captain,” Matt drawled flatly.  He pressed back sullenly into his chair.  “Your favorite trick won’t work on a ship that size.”

Lance glanced between Allura and Shiro, uncomfortable at the tension between them.  “Um, what trick?”  And then a second later, “Captain?”

“We turn off the environmental controls,” Sam replied. “Short them out with a dedicated burst of energy.  Then Takashi breaks in and takes advantage while they’re still adjusting.”  He reached over Katie and gave Matt’s shoulder a tight squeeze.  It was shaken off immediately, and Sam shot him a look from the corner of his eye.

Coran frowned at them.  “You have some sort of personal environment generator?”

“Nope,” Shiro replied, downright cheerful now.  If there was something he loved, it was how  _ confused _ the so-called more advanced species got about dealing without environmental controls.  “Well, my helmet has night vision for when the lights shut off.  The rest is just pushing off of the walls and the occasional propulsion boost.  Like your jetpacks.”  He tapped the center of his back, grinning with all his teeth.

No one was very comforted by the grin, but that was okay.

“And this method is... effective?”  Allura asked carefully.

Matt snorted.  “Considering we just robbed a mid-sized Galra vessel, I’d say yeah.  It really is.”

“We were trained in how to manage in zero-G environments for long periods of time,” Sam explained.  “It was part of the original Kerberos mission.  We expected to spend a year and a few weeks without those sorts of aids.”

Coran looked faintly green at the idea.  “Well, if it works.”

“Not here it doesn’t,” Matt corrected.  “We use it on, like, transport class ships.  Not full-on commander warbirds.  We’re not going to have the juice to knock those out.”

Katie snorted and knocked Matt’s shoulder.  “You kidding?  We’ve got plenty of power in this ship and a brand new Balmera crystal.  If your technology needs a bit more power to knock out Sendak’s ship, the Castle can give you plenty.”

Brows rising, Matt looked around with new eyes, mouth falling open.  “Oh.  True.  We can- I think we can.  Dad?”

Sam considered, head tilted.  “We haven’t seen what the castle is capable of, but it’s a fairly specialized blast.  So long as we can get the shot and give it more energy than the  _ Swift Warning  _ can, I think it’s possible.  I’d have to do the calculations to be sure.  We’d need to take the shot before they can put up proper shielding, but otherwise...”

“I can help,” Hunk volunteered immediately.  

Matt paused.  “Uhh...”  He glanced down at Katie, who nodded.  “Alright, sure.  We’ll get started on that.  If we can just plug it into whatever the castle uses to fire, shouldn’t take long.”

Relaxing, Hunk nodded.  “Okay.  Good.”

“C’mon, let’s go to the  _ Swift Warning _ and I’ll show you how we do it.”  Matt bounded up to his feet, and offered his hand to Katie to help her up.  She took it, fingers wrapped desperately around the sharp jut of Matt’s wrist bone.  Sam stood as well, his hand centered between Katie’s shoulder blades, as Hunk led them all out.

As they left, Katie looked over Matt’s braided hair.  “What’s with the new look?”

“What’s with  _ yours?” _ Matt shot back, grinning. 

Then they were gone.

“Well.” Shiro drew out the word, leaning back in the chair and steepling his fingers.  Keith’s brow raised at him, probably aware the posture was strange for him, but Shiro ignored that easily.  “Glad this all worked out.  I’ll get Keith all kitted out, since he’s going to have to come along on this half-baked adventure.  While Sam and Matt are getting the shot set up, we should practice.  Does the grav turn off somewhere?

Allura eyed him, but she nodded.  “You can use the training room.”

“Can I come?” Lance asked, perking.

Ah, poor guy didn’t really have anything else to do, did he?  In that case, Shiro wasn’t going to leave him behind.  “Sure, your jetpacks should work for this.  If not, we get can get you boots like mine.  We’ve got a few since I kept upgrading.  They’re outdated but they’ll do for this.  You still the same size as me, Keith?”

Keith nodded.  “For shoes?  Yeah.”

“Good.  We’ll figure it out.  Worse comes to worse we’ll steal Matt’s.  He left them around with a pirate, he’s getting what’s coming to him.”  He grinned, brows up mischievously, and Lance beamed back like Shiro had personally pinned a medal to his chest.

On the other hand, Keith looked distinctly put out.  Which was fair.  He’d probably expected some one-on-one time.  Shiro couldn’t lie and say he didn’t want that, but there’d be time for that later.  Catching Keith’s eye, Shiro gave him a significant nod, expression softening.  Keith’s shoulders relaxed in turn, and there was a hint of an curl to his lips.

Yeah, they were still fine.

It was comforting beyond words that they still had this understanding.  Even after over a year and a half, he and Keith could still lock eyes and just  _ get _ it.

“I’ll leave you to it, then,” Allura confirmed, pushing herself up as well.

The fond warmth left, like ice dumped into hot water.  “Well, with your permission,” Shiro drawled, not looking back at her.

Allura paused, her expression tight.  But she nodded and put her hand on Coran’s shoulder as he bristled again.

Before they left, Shiro glanced after them.  “Oh, and if someone could turn off whatever’s causing that damn buzzing, that’d be great.”

Both Alteans paused.  “Buzzing?” Coran clarified.

Huh.  Maybe it wasn’t audible to them.  Shiro tapped his ear.  “Yeah, it’s been going this whole time.”

“Where is it coming from?” Allura asked, her eyes narrowed in thought.

Good question.  Now that he could move around the room more, he could figure that out.  Shiro tilted his head and took a few steps left and right.  “Up and to the left.”  He pointed in the correct direction.  “That the engine room or something?”

“Or something,” Allura replied flatly.  She glanced over at Coran, whose face was very pinched indeed.

Well, whatever it was that bothered them, Shiro didn’t really care.  “Can it be turned off then?”

Allura took a deep breath.  “I’m not sure.  We’ll see.  Coran?”

“Yes, Princess.”  They high-tailed it out, their heads bend together urgently.

Shit.  Hopefully the place wasn’t about to blow.  Or, at least, not while they were on it.

“So, let’s hit the  _ Swift Warning _ and grab some supplies,” Shiro said.  “Those neon helmets of yours - they have night vision?”

Keith glanced after Allura, frowning, but then nodded.  “Yeah.”

Good.  Shiro nodded back.  One less thing to get working, then.  “Great, let’s teach you how to parkour in zero-G.”

“Cool,” Lance breathed, siding up to Shiro.  “What did you steal from the Galra ship?”

Grinning at him, wild and pleased, Shiro slid his hands into his jacket pockets.  “Well, that’s the thing-”

He wove the tale as they walked, starting from how they’d picked up the Galra chatter.  Lance added enthusiastic questions.  Keith trailed half a step behind him, attentive but apart from them.

Yeah, Shiro would have to handle that later.

***

“This was not the kind of helping I had in mind,” Lance commented unhappily.  He swivelled his head but the room was too dark.  The movement caused just enough force to make him start spinning in place, and he slapped at the air to try to still himself.

Chuckling, Shiro braced himself against the wall.  “You got to play with your jetpack in zero G.  That’s cool,” he pointed out, watching through his night vision as Keith crept up on Lance’s other side.  

“I thought I was going to get to do the sneaking,” Lance groaned.  “I’d be good at that.  I’m a sneak master.  I got past all the Garrison officers to go out on the town all the time.”

Shiro suspected ‘all the time’ was an exaggeration, but he smiled anyway.  “You and most of the upperclassman.  Myself included.”

“You did?” Lance replied, turning toward Shiro’s voice.  He had probably forgotten about Keith in the pitch darkness of the training room.  “Really?  You seemed too straight laced before you went pirate.”

“Only because I controlled my image,” Shiro replied easily, moving in counter to Keith’s slow prowl forward, keeping Lance’s attention in the other direction.  “I wanted them to pick me for the cool missions, right?  There couldn’t be a spot on my record.  So I was just careful. Gotta be watchful of your environment, you know?”

Keith tilted his head in what was probably amusement, then suddenly jetted forward.  The roar of his jetpack was enough to make Lance turn around.  He brought his bayard up, and it flashed into his weapon, illuminating Keith’s covered face for just a moment.  But it wasn’t enough time to react as he was tackled at speed.  

They both crashed hard into the wall. Keith struggled against Lance’s longer reach.  But seeing in the dark was too much of an advantage.  He was able to wrest the gun from Lance’s clutching fingers.

“Light to twenty percent,” Shiro called, and pulled off his helmet so he could see them properly.  He scratched over his ear.  The stupid humming hadn’t stopped.  “Nice take down, Keith.  And that was clever, Lance.  I didn’t know your weapons put off light like that.”

Lance beamed and shoved Keith off of him.  Keith floated away several feet from the force before he used his jetpack to equalize it.  Their packs turned out to be much stronger than the boots, but they put off a lot more light, so it was a trade-off.  Shiro still wanted one.

“Thanks,” Lance replied, though he looked put out at being bested.  “Now give it back, Keith.”  The name had just a hint of a tone.

Eyeing him, Keith threw the bayard.  Lance snatched it out of the air with a huff.  “It’s been an hour,” Keith replied.  “I don’t know we’ll get much more time than this.”  He didn’t look at Lance, gaze steady on Shiro.

Really, they didn’t gel  _ quite _ as well as Shiro would have expected.  But then, he was basing their interactions on himself, Matt and Sam, who had months of learning to work with each other before they started for Kerberos.  Still, it stuck out, and it was something to keep an eye on-

Wait, no.  Shiro was getting ahead of himself.  There was no time later to keep an eye on anything.  Shiro was going to help them get their silly lions, let them make a Voltron, maybe grab some shinies to sell to make this job worth the frustration, then run for it.  

With or without Sam and Matt.

Shiro suspected it would be without.  

Or maybe-

No, that was  _ definitely  _ getting ahead of himself.

Tucking his helmet against his hip, Shiro smiled at them both.  “Well, let’s get ready to go, then.  Won’t take long once we’re set up.  We’ll just fly over and give them a quick hello.”

“I can ask if it’s ready,” Lance offered, tucking his bayard against his thigh.  It disappeared into the suit without a trace.

Shiro nodded absently, scratching his ear again.  “That’d be great, thank you.  Hey, you guys don’t have any extra of those bayard things lying around, do you?”

“Nope,” Lance replied, cheerfully smug.  “You gotta be a paladin.  We don’t even have the black one.  Apparently it disappeared a long time ago.”

Damn.  “Well, maybe it’ll turn up on the market someday, then,” Shiro muttered.  “Worth looking for.  Okay, brace yourselves.  Gravity back on.”

Shiro’s casual tone belied the order, and neither Keith or Lance were prepared when gravity suddenly engaged.  They fell to the ground in a heavy heap.  

Landing on his feet, Shiro grinned at them.  “Gotta be prepared,” he sing-songed.  “Even if you have cool magic weapons.”

Pushing himself to his feet, Lance pouted but nodded.  “Alright.  I’ll call on the comms when I know what’s up.  Later!”  He set off at a trot, waving over his shoulder.

Shiro watched him go, amused.  “He’s way more fun than last time.  I like him.”

Keith only grunted, brushing off his armor as he stood.  “Maybe.  I guess.”

“Not your brand of fun?” Shiro asked, brows up.

Sighing, Keith shrugged.  “I’m not sure.  Maybe.  I don’t see it as much.  He spends more time with Pidge and Hunk than me.”

Which implied that Keith was the odd man out.

That made sense, honestly.  Keith wasn’t an alien like the Alteans, but he also didn’t have the bonding experience of flying and fighting with the other three, since he wasn’t attached to one of the lions.  Training, yes, but not that intense experience.  And knowing Keith, he wasn’t comfortable reaching out to try to create those bonds in the time between fights.  More likely, he threw himself into solitary pursuits in preparation for when he was a paladin, and made the isolation worse.

Shiro’s chest ached.  He reached out for Keith, clapping him on the shoulder.  “Well, sounds like it’s my duty to catch you back up on your socialization.”

Groaning dramatically, Keith stepped closer,  From the twitch of his lips, he was trying not to smile.  “Goody.  Do I get a pirate coat too?”

“The coat is super cool,” Shiro told him, nose in the air.  They stepped out into the hall and started back toward the main hangar.  “But if you want, yeah, we can get you one.  Better than that dinky red half-jacket.”

Keith scowled.  “I like my jacket.”

“Aesthetically it’s fine,” Shiro allowed.  “But it kind of fails the purpose of being a jacket and, you know, warming you up.  Does it even close?”  Keith scowled back so fiercely that Shiro couldn’t help laughing, even as his hand came up to scratch again.

Expression sobering, Keith frowned.  “You still hearing it?”

“You don’t?”  Shiro’s brows jumped up.  “Yeah.  It’s louder now.”

Keith shook his head.  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.  I don’t hear anything.”

Hmm.  “Well, I think the Alteans knew,” Shiro replied.  “They were acting shady about it.  So hopefully someone will fix it.  Maybe.”

Frowning, Keith tilted his head.  “What’s your problem with Allura and Coran, anyway?”

Shiro started to reply, then paused.  He didn’t know how to explain it.  “I just don’t like the whole ‘princess’ thing.  Titles and power dynamics and all that.  Not anymore.”

Shoulders slumping, Keith stared up at him.  “Because of...?”  He trailed off significantly.

“‘Cause of a lot of things,” Shiro replied, waving the question off.  His heart was starting to pick up just talking about it, and his fingers tightened around his helmet.  “Since everything.  I had a chance to think about myself and be someone other than a member of the Garrison.  I got to be a free man.  I don’t like that being compromised.”

Frowning, Keith narrowed his eyes.  “How does Allura being a princess compromise that?”

Shiro’s frown got darker.  “People in power want to keep that power.  They want to grow it.  They take advantage and change the rules for their own benefit.  I’m not about to let it happen again.”

“Oh.”  Keith frowned like he didn’t know what else to say to that.  “Did Allura say something?”

“No, that’s just how they are,” Shiro replied.  “When people have power over you, they can do anything.  And if they can, they will.  So I won’t let her have the chance.  I’ll keep it even between us no matter what I have to do.”

For some reason, Keith looked sad at that.  He looked Shiro up and down, then reached over and squeezed Shiro’s arm.  “I’m sorry.  About all of it.  I just wish-”  He bit his bottom lip.  “I get why you changed.”

Shiro’s shoulders slumped.  “Hey.  Keith.  I’m okay.”

Glancing up, Keith smiled, though it was thin.  “Yeah.  You’re here.  That’s what counts.”  He took a deep breath, visibly ready to change the topic.  “So.  What are you going to do after all this?”

“Depends on how well it goes,” Shiro replied, pushing back the tension and giving Keith a cheeky smile.  “Who knows, maybe it’ll all go straight to hell.  No sense planning before we know we’ll live.”

Keith groaned and shoved him.  “Well, some things haven’t changed.”

Laughing, Shiro pulled him closer and knocked his knuckles against the top of Keith’s helmet.  Keith pushed him harder, but he was openly smiling.  “Neither has this.”

“Stop!”  Obligingly, Shiro let him go. Keith pulled off his helmet to give what was supposed to be a glare, but was really more of a pout.  Then his expression softened, and he smiled at Shiro.  “Hey.  I missed you.  I missed this.”

Shiro’s heart cracked.  “Yeah.  I did too.”

A cleared throat behind them broke the moment.  

“Shiro?”

Tensing suddenly, Shiro looked over his shoulder, frowning at Allura.  She had her hands folded behind her back, shoulders straight and chin held high.

“Captain, if you don’t mind,” Shiro corrected.

Allura paused, lips thinning again, but she gave a short nod.  “Captain.  Can I speak with you?”

Glancing down at Keith, Shiro took a deep breath.  Part of him wanted to tell Allura no, just to be spiteful, but Keith was giving him that knowing, shadowed look.  So Shiro took a deep breath.  “Yeah, alright, if I must.  Go catch up with Lance, alright?”

Keith nodded, glancing between them once.  “I’ll help Matt and Sam prepare for heading out if they’re ready.”  He nodded to them both, then started off.

It wasn’t until Keith was completely gone that Allura took a deep breath.  “I want to... apologize.  I feel I may have insulted you, or somehow gotten off on the wrong foot.  I’d like to make amends so that this mission can go smoothly.”

Biting on his tongue, Shiro took a deep breath.  “Nothing personal, Princess,” he replied.  “I just don’t particularly like it here.  But no need to worry.  Assuming we all survive this, I’ll be out of all that hair of yours soon enough.”

Allura tensed further.  “Well, if there’s something we can do, please let me know.  For now, would you mind answering a few questions?”

Yeah, he would.  But as much as Shiro hated it, the princess had a point.  They did need to get along, and they needed the mission to go smoothly.  “Alright.  Ask away.”

“You are called Captain.  Clearly.  That denotes a position of leadership, yes?”

Shiro really didn’t see how that was relevant.  Scoping out the competition?  Trying to see if Shiro would take over the mission?  Joke was on her: other than getting everyone out alive, Shiro only cared about his bit.  “Yeah.  I’ve been running missions with temporary crews.  Pick up a few people who have been kicked while they were down and give them the chance to get back at the Galra.  Hit some ships, disrupt some trade.  It’s not a lot, but it certainly pisses the Galra off.”

For some reason, that made Allura’s lips thin further and she took a deep breath.  “I see.”

The silence hung for several long seconds.  Shiro reached up to tug at his ear.  “Okay, what is that noise?  You seemed to know what I was talking about, can you at least tell me what the hell is giving off feedback if you won’t turn it off?”

Allura took a deep breath, her hands dropping to her side. “I- yes.  I can tell you. Point again to where it’s from?  So I can be sure.”

Bristling at the implied order, Shiro narrowed his eyes at her.  But he really did want to know, so he reluctantly raised his hand and pointed to the right.

“What you’re hearing...”  Allura sighed, lips pursed.  “The Black Lion is trying to call to you.”

Shiro stared at her flatly.  “I’m sorry, one of those ridiculous lions is trying to get into my head too?”

This time, Allura’s eyes flashed with temper.  “The lions are not ridiculous,” she told him, voice clipped.

Staring back, Shiro raised an eyebrow.  “They’re brightly colored spaceships in the shape of giant lions.  They’re a little ridiculous.”

Allura visibly ground her teeth, but she waved his words off.  “Regardless,  _ yes. _  The Black Lion remains locked away until we have all four of the others, but I believe they recognize that you are planning to leave and are trying to call your attention.”

“By mosquito buzzing in my ear?” Shiro shot back.  “Good choice.  That’s definitely going to endear me to psychic robot lion ships and not make me want to leave earlier.  Weren’t you supposed to be the Black Paladin?”

“The noise will fade when you have contacted the lion,” Allura replied, voice still sharp.  “And that has been my plan, yes, for lack of other options.  However, I am absolutely essential for controlling the ship.  Coran can manage some of it alone, but he cannot create portals the way I can.  It was going to be... inconvenient, to say the least.  And the Black Lion has never called to me like they have for you.”

Shiro crinkled his nose.  “So, what, this is... this is a job offer?  Join your merry band of knights?”

“Paladins,” Allura corrected, the reference flying straight over her voluminous hair.

For a long moment, Shiro just stared, clutching his helmet.  “Pass.”

Allura’s eyes went wide.  “You cannot- do you not recognize how important Voltron is?”

“I heard you talk a lot about it, but apparently not,” Shiro drawled back, taking a step forward.  This time, Allura didn’t look uncomfortable.  She looked pissed instead, and she held her ground even when Shiro used his full height against her.  “‘Cause I’m not getting the part where I have to do it.”

Teeth nearly bared, Allura shook her head.  “The lion  _ chose _ you.  You are their paladin.  It is a sacred bond, and one that cannot be forced.  You  _ must _ take up this task.  Every moment we do not have Voltron is a chance for the Galra to take more lives and destroy more worlds.  You cannot understand-”

“I can’t understand?” Shiro growled back, eyes narrowed.  By now, there was barely half a foot between their chests.  Allura seemed almost exactly his height, rather than shorter like she should have been.  “Oh, I understand exactly what the Galra are like.  They did  _ this _ to me.”  He held up the metal arm, then used it to point at his face.  “I’ve been through the galaxy,  _ Princess. _  I’ve spoken with people whose lives have been destroyed, who have lost families and homes and hope.  I  _ know! _  But I don’t see what your Voltron has to do with it.”

Allura shook her head.  “You don’t understand what Voltron is.  It’s what Zarkon wants more than anything in the entire universe.  If we can reassemble it and use it against him, it’s the universe’s best chance at being saved.”

“After ten thousand years?”  Shiro gestured wide, trying to encompass all of the universe.  “There’s not much left to save, now.”

“What’s left of it is worth defending,” Allura told him, her voice dropping into something low and determined.  This time, Shiro took a step back from the force of her.  “It’s  _ always _ worth fighting for, even for a single remaining life.”

Shiro shook his head, his own gaze wild.  “It doesn’t have to be me.  You can do it!”

“I wasn’t chosen,” Allura repeated, each word slow and enunciated like Shiro was too stupid to follow.  “You were.  It has to be you.”

“I didn’t ask to be chosen!”  Shiro snapped back, the words ripping themselves out of him. “I never asked for any of this.  The weird lions are one thing, but I will not be  _ ruled _ again, do you understand me?  You will not own me!”

Allura’s mouth fell open. “I have said nothing of the sort!”

Sneering right back, Shiro snorted.  “Oh, and you’re not in charge of the paladins,  _ Princess? _  Do I get to wear the crown too?”

“Absolutely not!” Allura snapped back, hand twitching as if she wanted to reach up and cover her diadem.  “The Black Paladin is the leader.  I would simply offer guidance.”

“Yeah, sure,” Shiro replied.  He shook his head and stepped back again, head held high.  “Just guidance.  Right.  I believe you.  Well, sorry, Princess, but no luck.  Tell the lion to choose again.”

Allura took a deep breath.  “That’s not how it works.”

“Too bad.”

For a long moment, Allura just stared at him like she was taking in every inch of Shiro, from his shaggy, half-grown-out hair to his pirate coat to his boots.  Shiro stood tall under the judgement, aggressively rejecting any potential assessment.  “So that’s it?  You’ll let the universe burn because you’re too afraid of not being totally in charge?”

“Yup,” Shiro replied, smiling thinly.  “Try again with the next idiot you find.”

Allura shook her head.  “Fine.  You’re right about one thing.  The Black Lion chose poorly.  There will be another.”

Somehow, the words still managed to sting.  But Shiro offered her a toothy smile.  “Trust me, Princess, no one knows that better than me.”  He offered her a sarcastic bow, then turned on his heel, his coat snapping around his knees as he walked.

Allura didn’t call to him, and Shiro didn’t look back.


	5. Be cunning and full of tricks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter comes to your early because I don't know how active I'll be tomorrow. The final update will be on July 31st as expected.

As Shiro stepped into the hangar with the _Swift Warning,_ he was nearly bowled over by Katie.  He stepped out of the way quickly, and she shot him a quick nod but otherwise didn’t slow down.  Her fists were tight balls by her side and every step came down with more force than was necessary, a more dignified version of stamping her feet.

Huh.

Shiro walked backward through the door until she disappeared down a bend.  

Matt stood on the ramp of the _Swift Warning,_ arms crossed tightly over his chest and lips pressed thin.  When he saw Shiro, he scowled and looked away, shoving his bangs up and out of his face.  “Shut up.”

Brows up, Shiro stepped over.  “You told her you wanted her to leave, then?”

“I said shut up, Shirogane.  Can’t you hear?”

Shiro only grinned.  “Nope, I have that awful ringing in my ear.  Today I hear about as well as you do every other day.”

That only earned him a dark look.  “Seriously, not now,” Matt muttered.

Letting out a slow breath, Shiro nodded.  “Alright.  Talk to Sam about it.  But you know what he’s going to say.”

“I detect a lack of shutting up.”

“I detect a hint of hypocrisy,” Shiro shot back dryly.  “Alright, alright.  I’ll leave it.  Are we ready?  Everything good?”

Matt nodded slowly.  “Yeah, we were able to hook up my modifications to the castle.  It should be able to produce a blast big enough to knock out Sendak’s ship and keep it down for a while.  You’ll get about twenty minutes.”

Remembering the size of a commander’s warbird, Shiro frowned.  “That’s not a lot of time.”

“Better be fast, then,” Matt replied.  “That’s all I can guarantee you.”  He frowned at Shiro, head tilted.  “You going to be okay?”

Shiro frowned back, brow furrowing.  “Because of the ear thing?  Once we’re out of here it’ll be okay.  And we’ve done this a hundred times.”

“Not like this,” Matt replied gently.  Then he seemed to really register Shiro’s confusion.  “Cap- Shiro.  Do you not remember?”

Uh oh.  “Remember what?”

Matt’s shoulders slumped.  “More like who.  Sendak.  This is the ship we were taken to.  After Dad.  For the battles.”

Freezing utterly, Shiro stared at him.

Oh.

That-

“Well,” Shiro replied, forcing his numb lips to move.  “Maybe we’ll get lucky and I’ll remember some routes.”

Matt searched his face.  “You don’t- I can go with you.  Or Dad.  You don’t need to go alone with Keith.”

“You’re needed to control the blasts and the tech.  I can’t do what you do with our tech, especially with these modifications.”  Shiro shook his head.  “I work well with Keith.  He’ll keep me focused.”

“It doesn’t matter who’s with you if you’re going to be having flashbacks,” Matt hissed, voice dropping low.  He glanced back up the ramp to the _Swift Warning_ , checking if anyone had overheard.  “Be reasonable.”

Shiro stared back, jaw set.  “I am being reasonable.  This is the best distribution.  I’ll just have to deal with it.”

Letting out a little groan of frustration, Matt shook his head.  “That’s not how this works.”

“I’ll be fine.  I’m better than I was,” Shiro replied, shoulders tight.  

Matt met his gaze flatly.  “Laughing it off and never sleeping is better?”

“Apparently, since that’s how you deal with it too,” Shiro snapped.

Lips thinning, Matt took a step back, then nodded  “Alright.  Fine.  Just- stay safe, Takashi.  Okay?  I don’t want to get Katie back and lose you in the process.”

The tight knot in Shiro’s chest softened.  “Alright.  I get it.  I promise I’ll be okay.  But- you’re losing me anyway, Matt.  You know that, right?  Either you stay here and I leave, or you go back to Earth and I don’t.”

Matt’s eyes widened, then darkened as tears threatened.  He ducked his head, hiding his face.  “I- yeah.  Makes sense.  Either way, I want you safe.”

“You too,” Shiro replied gently.  Reaching out, he squeezed Matt’s shoulder.  “And I want you happy.”

“Sappy son of a bitch,” Matt muttered.  He grabbed onto the front of Shiro’s coat and pulled him in for a full-bodied hug.  “A freakin’ bleeding heart.”

Shiro smiled and held onto Matt just as tightly.  “You caught me.  And under all that bluster you care.  Soft touch.”

“I take it back.  I hate you.”  But Matt held on tighter and took a few deep breaths, probably trying to regain control of himself.  “You sure you don’t want to come with us?”

Picking his head up, Shiro frowned down at Matt.  “Are you serious?”

“I don’t like you alone,” Matt said.  “Who’s going to deflate that big head of yours?  Come home.  You don’t have to reject all of Earth because of the Garrison, you know.”

Shiro sighed and shrugged.  Maybe not, but there wasn’t much else tying him on Earth.  With Keith gone and the Garrison being what it was, Shiro didn’t want his feet nailed down.  At least in the rest of the universe he had the wide, empty black to explore.  “I won’t be alone.  I’ll get another crew soon enough, you know how I am.”

“Then you’ll drop them all of when the mission is over and start again.  That’s not being around people, that’s being momentarily part of a crowd.”  Matt sighed and stepped back, absently patting Shiro on the chest.  “But, hey, if we stay here, you could-”

Shiro’s hard look cut him off.

Matt wasn’t surprised.  “Alright, yeah, fair enough.  Just think about it, will you?  C’mon, we were just about done.  Katie made a cloaking device that we added to the _Swift Warning.”_

Brows up, Shiro tilted his head.  “I thought we already had one, or did I imagine it?”

“Katie’s is better,” Matt muttered, tone dark.  “It’s the end, Cap, I’ve become obsolete.  I’m the old model now.”

“You didn’t have the same resources, you big baby,” Shiro replied, rolling his eyes.  “But I’ll take it anyway.”

Matt huffed.  “Yeah, you should.  But just you wait.  I’ll show her.  I’ll show them all.  Mwahaha.”  He curled his fingers dramatically, despite the flat delivery.  “Now go on, your duckling is on board.  You’re both going to have to cram into that little side-ship of yours.”

Ugh.  Well, if Shiro was going to have someone practically laying on top of him, at least it was someone he was comfortable with. “Alright.  Let’s get settled in and do some damage.”

“Let’s save a Balmera,” Matt agreed.  “That’s wild, isn’t it?  Utterly crazy.”

Shiro hummed.  “So was escaping the Galra.”

Laughing, Matt shoved him up the ramp.  “True enough.  Now get.  Time’s a wastin’.”

Hands up like Matt was walking him up at gunpoint, Shiro laughed and went.

***

Under Shiro’s practiced hands, the _Swift Warning_ flew smoothly toward Sendak’s ship.  So far, the castle had remained undetected, hidden by the Balmera’s atmosphere and its own shielding capabilities.  So for now, they could take their time creeping over.  While that could change at any time, Shiro still found the moment nice.  Calm, almost, like sending a paper boat over a lake.

Of course, those boats eventually crumpled and sank.  Shiro would prefer that part of the analogy not come to pass.

The screens displayed like a windshield, showing the huge expanse of the commander’s ship, including the many smaller crafts flying to and from the Balmera.  They hadn’t dared try to listen in on the Galra chatter when they needed to stay undetected, but Shiro could guess.  The Galra were mining it for all they could, pulling off all the resources they could manage, and then waiting.

It was probably a trap.  The Paladins had been here before - or, Hunk and Coran had been, while everyone else worked on stabilizing the castle and practicing in case Sendak reappeared for round two.  

But that didn’t mean they couldn’t ambush the ambush.

Turning the screens, Shiro scanned the surface of the Balmera, calculating where the three lions already under the castle’s control were heading to the surface.  The paladins would be ferrying as many Balmerans as they could manage to the castle.  If they were able to get the fourth lion and form Voltron, then Coran, Sam and Matt would use the distraction to land and try and get the rest of the Balmerans.

The giant spines and hazy surface of the Balmera caught Shiro’s attention, giving off a glowing halo in the reflected light of the nearest sun.  From his experience owning and maintaining a ship, Shiro had heard about Balmeras, if only in vague sense - the synthetic crystals were based on them.  The fakes had enough power to keep a ship running with no other fuel.  He couldn’t imagine what the real things could do.  

There were people down there, living on the surface and down into the tunnels, but Shiro had never seen them.   Shiro wanted them to survive.  He wanted them to be free of the Galra.  He wanted everyone to have autonomy, to be able to make their own choices and shape their own lives.  But it was a distant desire, a general good will.

Seeing the Balmera itself, something clicked.

That wasn’t a planet like it appeared.  That was a living being, one that was pained and wounded and dying.  One that had been chained and exploited, gutted from the inside and made into a tool of its oppressors.  The Balmera made the Galra more powerful by giving them crystals, but it was a painful, forcible excavation.

Swallowing hard, Shiro reached out, his fingers stopping just shy of the projected screen.  Though he couldn’t touch, he ran his fingers along the Balmera’s spines.

Shiro wanted the Balmerans to be free and happy.

But more than that, Shiro wanted the Balmera to _live._  He wanted it to come out scarred but renewed, to have control over its body again.  

The projected screen lit Shiro in the otherwise dark interior of the _Swift Warning._ It highlighted the raised skin of the scar on his face and reflected color off the white strands of his hair.

He stood there for several minutes, lost in looking and wanting, until Keith stepped in.  “Shiro?”

Starting, Shiro faced Keith and offered a smile.  His hand dropped back down to the console, fingers tucking into a fist to hide the way they’d been outstretched.  “Hey.”

“How long till we hit Sendak’s ship?”  Keith asked.  Seeing what was on the screen, he paused.  “Is something happening to the Balmera?”

“Nothing that wasn’t already a problem,” Shiro replied.  A wave of his hand refocused the screens on Sendak’s ship.  The _Swift Warning_ passed by, quiet and invisible, so far in no danger of any of the smaller ships’ paths.  They weren’t heading for the flagship’s hanger, after all.  “Three minutes, I think.”

Keith nodded determinedly, pulling on his helmet.  “You’re just going to leave the _Swift Warning_ floating out here?”

Lips thinning, Shiro nodded.  “Not much else we can do with her.  Matt and Sam were needed on the castle, and the other three were needed in the lions.  It’ll be alright.  We’re out of the way.  So long as we stay undetected and the shielding stays up, there’s no reason for anyone to know the ship is here.”

“We’ll get it back,” Keith soothed, nodding.  Then his lips curled up.  “You can’t be Captain without a ship.”

Oh, goddamn.  “Don’t start,” Shiro muttered.  “Bad enough I get it from Matt.”

“You really called yourself that?” Keith asked, eyes bright.

Shiro rolled his eyes and put on his own helmet as well.  He tapped on the console, slowing the velocity of the ship, then turned down the hall.  “For a little while.  A couple of weeks.  It was just something I was trying.”

“Why Captain?” Keith asked.  “Why not Lieutenant?”

Flinching, Shiro shook his head.  “No way.  I don’t want anything to do with that anymore.  Captain is a rank too, yeah, but- I saw the coat when I get to the nearest inhabited planet and I just got it.  And I figured a pirate was pretty damn far from a military officer and from- from a prisoner, too.  That sounded good at the time, that’s all.”

Keith’s eyes were very sad as he looked Shiro over.  “I’m sorry.  If I’d gotten there faster-”

“Hey,” Shiro interrupted, roughly nudging their shoulders together. “None of that.  It’s not your fault.  Not the Garrison, and not my reaction to them.  I’m okay.  I’m _good._  I know that’s hard to believe, but I really am.”

Keith tilted his head forward, his bangs half covering his eyes.  “You’ve changed so much.”

Smiling thinly, Shiro shrugged.  “Not really.  Not in the important ways.  We still fit, don’t we?”

“Yeah.”  Keith smiled back, just as ragged.  “Alright.  So.  Captain.  That’s done?”

“To the degree it was,” Shiro replied carefully.  “I still kind of like the idea.  It’s-”  He shrugged.  “I like it.”

In the end, it was something to be.  Shiro had been Lt. Shirogane and Champion.  Captain was a rejection of them both.  Of the options, that was who Shiro wanted to be.

“Can you be a Captain without a crew, though?” Keith asked carefully, opening the hatch for them to pile into the _Swift Warning’s_ small side vessel.  

Shiro snorted.  “Well, I’ll get a crew.  That’s what we do.  They just don’t stick around.  It’s always one time deals.”

“Except for the Holts,” Keith pointed out.  

Glancing at him, Shiro tapped on the console.  The vessel snapped off the side of the _Swift Warning_. The panel shut instantly against the void of space as Shiro started to navigate away.  The little ship had only one seat and not a lot of elbow room to begin with, so he and Keith were pressed completely together from shoulder to knees.  

“Until now,” Shiro replied.  “They’re not going to break up their family again.”

“So you’ll need someone else.”

Frowning at him, Shiro tilted his head.  Hope bloomed in his chest, tentative but powerful.  “What are you getting at, Keith?”

Keith frowned, hands folded in his lap.  “Just- I missed you.  I know you.  We work together already.  I don’t really have that with the others.  They have experiences I don’t, because I had to stay on the ship without a lion.  And they just get along better.  They were already friends, or at least knew each other.”

“Well, we had a year and change to get good at reading each other,” Shiro pointed out.  “That wasn’t easy at first, either.  Considering you spent most of it wanting to deck me.”

Smiling softly, Keith nodded to his knees.  “Yeah, I did,” he murmured, his voice nostalgic.  “Even so.  I just- I know Allura says I can do all the Red Paladin stuff, and I want to do good but... you do good elsewhere, right?  Right after we got the lions, Pidge and I didn’t want to leave Arus.  But I gave up, and Allura thought her father had been right to be defensive.  So we did it.  And that planet-”  He closed his eyes.  “And now the Balmera.  I don’t know that _this_ is what I want.  Or that I’m with the people I want to be with.”

Shiro took a deep breath.  “It’ll be different with a lion though, won’t it?  And with Voltron?”

“Will it?” Keith asked.  “I don’t know.  Allura says so, but we’re supposed to work together.  We’re supposed to be a flawless unit.  And I’m not that person.  I was never good at the whole ‘team building’ thing.  Nothing in the past few months has changed that.”

“What do you want, Keith?” Shiro asked softly.  “That’s what I care about.  I don’t- the universe stuff is important, but you have to make the call that’s right for you.”

Keith took a deep breath as Sendak’s ship got closer on screen.  “I want this.  With you.  We still work.  We’re still a team.  And you’re doing something, even if it’s not a big scale thing like Voltron is supposed to be.  I want to fight.  I don’t want to keep running.  We did it for Arus, and we’re not doing it here because Hunk’s attached, but I don’t know what’ll happen to the next world.”

Swallowing hard, Shiro took his hands off the controls.  “Are you sure?  It’s not easy, Keith.  We never had a lot of resources or- or anything we needed, really.”

For a long moment, Keith was quiet.  Then he shook his head. “Seriously?  Shiro, who are you talking to?”

Unable to help it, Shiro smiled at Keith.  “Yeah, you’re right.”  The helmet smushed Keith’s still too-long bangs into his face, but his eyes were clear and uncovered as they met Shiro’s.  Moving to clap his shoulder would be hard in the tight confines, so instead Shiro leaned over a couple of inches and clacked their foreheads together.  “Keith, you are always welcome with me.  I’ll never turn you away if that’s what you want.  But maybe wait until you’ve done the lion thing before you decide.  Promise me that?  I want you to understand both sides.”

Keith bit his bottom lip but nodded.  “Okay.  We need to do that anyway.”  Slowly he smiled, almost shy.  “I like it, though.  Me and you, flying and sneaking.  It’s familiar.”

“Yeah, it is.”  Shiro’s own smile was shaky.  He swallowed against a molten, melting lump in his throat just as their ship turned, the bottom sticking into place against the side of Sendak’s ship.

Show time.

The top popped off, and Shiro floated out first, activating the magnets in his glove.  He stuck fast and got his feet under him, which stuck as well.  Then he reached out to Keith, giving him someone solid to hold onto.  Tilting his head to the side, he used his shoulder to tap against the side of his helmet and re-engage his comms.  “Sam?”

“We read you, Takashi,” Sam replied easily.  “Are you in position?”

“All ready to go,” Shiro replied.  “I’m just going to cut through, I think.  I want to save our door charges for inside.  Everything good with the lions?”

Lance cleared his throat.  “We’re having a little trouble convincing the Balmerans to leave.  Being subtle and giving us more time would be good.”

“I’ll head down to the surface on my own,” Allura replied immediately.  “I may be able to help.”  

Brows up, Shiro glanced at Keith, who stared back like that was no big deal.

The Princess was getting her hands dirty and doing the hard work with everyone else.  That _was_ a big deal.  Shiro’s captors in the Galra wouldn’t have done that.  Fraiser had barely been willing to pass on requests for him, much less fulfil them.  And for what?  What could Allura do that Hunk, Katie and Lance couldn’t?

Then again, she did understand what it meant to lose her world.

“Understood,” Shiro replied carefully, swallowing another taste of shame.  It didn’t matter what she’d been through.  Allura was still a princess, and she was still trying to force him into a role of servitude under her.  That was what mattered.  “Keep us updated.  Fire when ready.”

There was a pause, filled with tapping and soft beeps.  “Okay,” Matt breathed.  “Let’s see what this puppy can do.  We’re locked on and firing in 5... 4.... 3.... 2... 1... Fire!”

Unlike when the _Swift Warning_ shot, there was no flash from where the ship had been.  Instead there was about two seconds of nothing, then _something_ crackled against the surface of the flagship.

From the outside, there was no sign anything had gone wrong.  The ship still vibrated slightly through the hull as the engines continued to go.  

But Shiro had total faith in Matt and Sam’s ability to make this work.  Pulling Keith closer, Shiro gestured for him to hold on, then used his free hand to start cutting his way through.

The inside was dark.

Grinning, Shiro activated his night vision and floated them inside.

They found themselves in a huge, empty hallway.  It was totally uniform, without so much as doors to break the monotony.  Both sides stretched down to turns without any indication of where they went.  

The night vision of their helmets totally lit up any shadows and cast it all in bright greens, which Shiro appreciated.  Like this, he could almost forget this was a Galra ship.

Not just a.   _The._

This was where it had all gone to hell for him.

“Okay,” Shiro murmured, looking at Keith.  “Which way?”

Keith twitched.  “What do you mean, which way?  How should I know?”

Flapping a hand vaguely, Shiro huffed.  “Shouldn’t you have, like, kitty senses or whatever?”

Keith’s expression was obscured by the glass of his visor, but his head tilt was incredulous.  “Seriously?”

“I don’t know!  I don’t know how any of this works!”

Keith threw his arms wide.  “We don’t have time for this.  Let’s just pick a direction and go.”

Okay.  Shit.  Where would a secondary hangar be in a commander class ship?

More toward the front, probably.  Up and to the left, ish.  That was the most guarded area on a Galra ship, nearest the bridge and where they liked to keep the valuables.  Gesturing for Keith to follow, Shiro gave his boots a single burst and turned to the left.  It was enough to gain momentum, and without gravity engaged, only air resistance was fighting them.  It meant Shiro had to give it a little gas every twenty seconds or so, but at least he wasn’t constantly giving off light and sound.   Keith copied quickly with his jetpack, and soon they were cruising smoothly and silently through the ship.

The first obstacle they ran into was a single soldier.  Shiro tensed, prepared to attack, as they flailed in place, trying to reach a wall to push off of.

Holding up a finger to his face plate in signal, Shiro pushed off the wall and moved closer, like a predator silently stalking prey.

Except the soldier got lucky.  Their flailing managed to swipe too close to Shiro, making him flash his boots to avoid getting beaned in the head.

Startling at the sudden light and sound, the soldier twisted and aimed their blaster toward where Shiro’s boots had been.  They fired, missing Shiro’s feet, but only just.

Damn.

There was a flash of light, and then Keith shot past, not even bothering to hide his jetpack.  He swiped with his bayard, but most of the attack was the concussive force of flying into them. The soldier went flying away, bouncing against the walls and going still.

Shiro held his breath, listening hard, but he didn’t hear any reinforcements.  No one had been summed by the shots or fight.

For now.

“Good work,” Shiro said.  “But next time just stab, it causes less noise in the long run.”

Keith snorted.  “Didn’t seem to matter.  C’mon, how long do we have?”

“Seventeen more minutes,” Shiro replied, giving his own burst from his boots.  “We need to get you to that lion well before time runs out.  It’s going to be guarded and we need that advantage.”

Keith was probably making a face behind the visor.  Shiro grinned back and resisted the urge to clap him on the shoulder.  Right now it would only push him into a wall.

As they reached the stairs, there was a clattering above.  Another soldier floated there, halted halfway through walking down.  They have gotten their bearings at least a little, their huge claws wrapped around the railing of the stairs to help stay upright.  They were snarling out questions into their comm, not waiting for any kind of reply.

Rather than go for the soldier, Shiro held up a finger to his mask, and Keith nodded back.  On a smaller ship, Shiro would attack just because any Galra could be a problem later.  But now Shiro and Keith just didn’t have the time, and they wouldn’t be leaving this way again anyway.  If all went well, they’d have a new ride.  If all didn’t, they’d be too dead to leave.

Shiro pushed off the wall let the momentum carry him past, occasionally using his hands to readjust his course.  Keith simply kicked off the ceiling, the sound hidden by the soldier’s yelling _(“environmental controls don’t just give out.  What’s happening upstairs?”)._

Once they were at the top, Shiro let out a little chuckle. “That part’s fun.”

“Enjoy later,” Keith reminded.  “Where to now?”

Shit.  Looking back and forth down the hall, Shiro racked his brain.  Where we they?  This time there were doors with small signs, and when Shiro squinted he could just make out the shape of the letters.

Which he recognized.

Even if he couldn’t read them, anxiety hit him like a physical thing.  His heart pounded and his breath went shallow.

This hallway was bad.  It was dangerous and it meant pain, it meant bright lights overhead and shadowed figures leaning over him.  It meant being strapped down and helpless as someone reached for a glowing blade-

“Shiro!”  The name was practically yelled into his ear from the microphone.  As his vision cleared, he wasn’t staring up at the ceiling anymore.  Keith’s faceplate hovered above him.  There were hands on each of his shoulders, clutching tight like Keith was about to shake him.  “C’mon, Shiro, wake up.”

Taking several ragged breaths, Shiro blinked tears from his eyes, glad Keith wouldn’t be able to see them through Shiro’s helmet.  His hands shook until he balled them into fists.

“How long?” Shiro spat out, his voice a dry croak.

Keith went still.  “We’ve got about thirteen minutes left.”

 _Damn._  They couldn’t afford this.  There wasn’t time.

Wait.  Where had Shiro been dragged from?  What had he seen on the way?

His stomach churned, but Shiro focused.  They’d taken him from his cell in the prisoners quarters, pitch blank and small, and yanked him out, pulling him behind them no matter how he struggled.  They’d gone past other cells, past the halls that lead to the arena, and past-

“This way,” Shiro said, firing off his boots.  He grabbed onto Keith’s wrist, tugging him along and jetting with as much speed as he dared.

Keith adjusted and started to help, keeping up easily.  Shiro didn’t let go yet, though. He felt better keeping Keith close.  “What was _that,_ Shiro?”

“Just remembering,” he replied.  “There’s still some... memory problems.  From that year.  It comes back at times.  I’ve been here before.”  The words came out clipped out of his dry mouth.  Glancing over, he considered Keith.  “Feel anything yet?”

Keith groaned.  “No, nothing.  What if- Shiro, what if Allura was wrong?”

Swallowing hard, Shiro took a deep breath.  “Then we blow our way out of here and get back to the _Swift Warning,_ and then we leave with the Balmerans we saved.”

Keith gave a slow, jerky nod.  “Alright,” he replied.  His tone wasn’t convinced, but like he _wanted_ to be convinced, which was close enough.

The next set of halls were quiet.  A ship like this- Shiro had always assumed it would be filled with hundreds of Galra.  But the more he remembered, the more he thought that wasn’t the case.  There were bots that went through certain sections, he thought, and then maybe a few dozen soldiers.

Or Shiro was forgetting something important.

They made their way closer to the main section of the ship.  Shiro closed his eyes.  How did they get to the secondary hangar from this direction instead of the cells?

But his concentration was wrecked when voices drifted from ahead.

Several of them.

A quick look at his display showed they had six minutes left.

Grabbing onto the edge of the hallway, Shiro poked his head past the curve.  A group of five soldiers were coming down the hall, pushing off clumsily and looking very wobbly indeed, but moving at a decent clip.

They were also directly in the way of the hallway Keith and Shiro needed.

Of course they were.  Because Sendak knew how desperately the paladins needed the other lions.  He knew they needed it for Voltron.  So when something went wrong, he made sure no one could get to the hangar.

Dammit, Shiro didn’t like it when targets made smart choices.

Turning, Shiro pulled a small device out of the pouch on his hip and pushed it into Keith’s hands.  “You’ll need this.”

Keith’s hand closed automatically around it.  “Why?  What is this?”

“It’ll open a door,” Shiro replied.  “The hangar will probably be locked down.  This will get you in.”

“Get me in?” Keith repeated darkly.  “Not us?”

Shiro hummed.  “You go ahead.  I’ll meet up.”  When Keith’s shoulders set angrily, Shiro held up a hand.  “I can take a few soldiers while I have the advantage.  But we’ve got five minutes to get in there while the grav is still off. We can’t fight them that fast and get to the lion.  And you’re the one that needs it.”

Keith shook his head.  “I still don’t know what door it is!”

“You will,” Shiro told him.  “I know you can do it.  You always pull through, Keith.  Just focus.  Be patient and listen, okay?”  He made a face, even if Keith couldn’t see it.  “Listen for the damn humming.”

“The-” Keith went suddenly quiet, pieces no doubt clicking into place.  “Shiro, you-”

Pushing off the wall, Shiro gave a grim smile.  “No time to talk.  I’ll distract them, you get to the lion, and then you can claw us up an exit. Okay?”

He didn’t wait for an answer.  Instead Shiro floated into the middle of the hall and activated his arm, then put his helmet on speaker.

“Hey, uglies one through five.  You’re in my goddamn way.”

There was a long, surprised pause.  Then one of them shot forward with surprising dexterity, kicking off the wall and aiming their gun at Shiro.  The rest followed after, eyes bright as they attacked.

Grinning that nasty, vicious smile, Shiro met them halfway.

This was a different level of soldier than the ones Shiro was used to fighting on transport ships.  When Shiro took a swipe, the soldier grabbed onto his shoulder and used the lack of gravity to swing around him, trying to strike at his unprotected back.

But Shiro had been doing this for a while now.  More importantly, he’d been called the Champion for a reason.

Activating his boots, Shiro turned one leg to the side until he spun in place like a violent ballerina.  He extended his arm, creating a glowing arch of dangerous energy.  It hit the soldier who twisted around him, slicing them in the arm.  It sent them crashing into the wall, away from where Keith was slipping past.

The light of his prosthetic was a problem here, though.  In short bursts it was fine, but when it was on, it made a huge portion of Shiro’s night vision go white.  As soon as the first soldier was knocked away, Shiro turned it back off.

A second soldier was right in front of him.

Biting back a yelp, Shiro kicked out, trying to push off of the Galra and get more distance.  

The soldier took the blow and caught his leg.  Shiro twisted, lashing at their shoulder instead.  They grunted and took the blow.  Without proper balance and something to push off of, Shiro was just smacking them.  

Gritting his teeth, Shiro closed his eyes and activated his arm again.  Reeling back, he punched the soldier right in the side of the face.  The soldier _roared_ in pain and fury.

The sound was familiar.  Shiro had heard Galra soldiers sound like that before when he’d tried to fight his way free.  He’d never succeeded.  It had meant pain later.

A shiver ran through Shiro.  His movements stuttered for just a moment, which was long enough for two more soldiers to grab him.  One got him around his right shoulder and the other pressed the muzzle of their blaster to his side.

On screen, the timer clicked down to thirty seconds.

“I know you,” the one on his shoulder murmured.  They drew their lips back in a fanged, nasty smile.  “You are the Champion.  I recognize your weapon.  There is no other quite like it.”

 _Shit._  

The fifth soldier stayed several feet away as they spoke into their comm.  “Commander Sendak, we have apprehended the intruder.  It seems to be the Champion.”

_Shit shit shit._

Shiro jerked with all his might, activating the jets again.  It sent all three of them crashing into the ceiling at force.  He was prepared, but that didn’t make it hurt less.  At least he took it better than the other two, who cried out in pain.  As their grips loosened, Shiro tilted his boot again and started to spin wildly, trying to shake them.

The timer beeped as it hit five... four... three... two...

Gravity reengaged, and Shiro wasn’t able to get his feet back under him in time.  He and the two soldiers restraining him crashed to the ground.  Shiro took the weight of both of them, making him cry out.  A second later, the lights turned back on, completely whiting out his night vision.

But at least all the soldiers were occupied with keeping Shiro still as he continued to fight.  They cuffed his wrists in front of him, making Shiro’s heart stutter in his chest.  A cold sweat broke out over his skin at the familiar noise.  

It was fine. Shiro could work with this.  No one was looking for a second intruder right now.  At least, not that Shiro could tell.

Taking hold of the cuffs, the soldiers dragged Shiro behind him, making his jacket slide along the dirty floor and his shoulders scream in protest.  He tried to activate his arm again, but it did nothing except heat the cuffs and burn his other wrist.

With his vision gone, Shiro couldn’t see, he didn’t know where they were going.  He-

They were-

They were taking him to Haggar.

Panic took over, whiting out his vision more effectively than the lights.  Shiro kicked and screamed and flailed, trying to catch his feet on anything to help yank him away, trying to connect with anything that could hurt and let him go.

No one listened to his screams.  Just like before.

Finally he came to a stop.  Shiro was shoved roughly to his knees, arms still bound behind him.  Claws pressed against his throat.  Shiro froze on pure, animal instinct.  He was helpless if they decided to cut across his neck.

Instead, the hands curled under his helmet and yanked it off.

For several long seconds, Shiro blinked against the sudden bright, purple lights.

But once he could see again, Shiro’s stomach dropped.

Seated in front of him, back straight and lips curled into a cruel smile, was a familiar figure.

“Ah, Champion,” Commander Sendak greeted.  “Welcome back to my ship.”


	6. Your People Will Never Be Destroyed

Shiro stared at Sendak, swallowing hard.

The commander grinned back, all pleased confidence.  He lounged in his seat, the larger prosthetic arm resting prominently across his lap and his red eye glowing brightly in the gloom.  Sendak made the rules on the ship.  He was totally in control of his space and everyone in.

And he knew it.

Even without Shiro’s few returning memories of Sendak, he would have hated him on sight.  This was a man with a title who would abuse it as far as he could.  If Shiro could, he’d run his right hand straight through that smug face.  His bound hands twitched in his lap.

Instead, Shiro was on his knees, handcuffed and bruised.

Meeting Sendak’s eyes, Shiro lifted his chin rebelliously.

Then he tilted his head.  “Champion?  Who’s that?”

Sendak didn’t move, but his single remaining eye narrowed.  “You.”

Eyes going theatrically wide, Shiro reared back on his heels.  He glanced at either side, figuring out which of the flanking guards was this ‘Champion’.  After a few seconds, he frowned at Sendak.  “Me?”

“Do not play stupid, Champion,” Sendak snapped back, his smug expression clouding into a storm. 

Shiro shook his head.  “No play.  Never heard of a Champion.  Weird name.”  He paused, then his eyes went wide and his mouth fell open in dramatic realization.  “Oh!  I see the confusion.  I’m  _ Captain. _  You know, like the person in charge of a ship.  They sound similar, right?  Easy mistake.”

Lips pinching, Sendak’s ears snapped back against his head.  “They do not sound similar at all.”

“They do in one of my languages,” Shiro replied easily, shrugging.  He looked around, casual as could be.

For a moment, Sendak only stared.  Then he stood slowly and stepped forward, his full height looming over Shiro.  Even for a Galra, Sendak was tall and broad.

Automatically, Shiro tried to lean away.  But Sendak grabbed Shiro’s chin, holding his head still.  The move tilted Shiro’s chin up painfully high.

Then Sendak ran the tip of his claw over the scar along Shiro’s nose.  “You cannot hide who you are.”

Shiro shivered violently.  Sendak’s touch made his skin crawl. “I’m a pirate.  Not hiding that.  Is this about the scar?  Plenty of people have scars, just like plenty of people have ugly faces.  You ever get mistaken for someone else with that mug?”

Pulling back, Sendak scowled down at him.  

Then he brought his metal hand up and backhanded Shiro.

Shiro’s vision exploded into white stars.  It was all he could do to keep his balance.  The metal had caught his skin, and his cheek ached as blood dripped down.

Well, fine.

Shiro licked his lips and picked his head back up.  “That’s a no, then?”

Growling, Sendak ignored his words.  “What were you doing here, Champion?”

“Okay, now you’re doing it on purpose.  Captain.  Say it with me.  ‘Cap’ for short, even, if it’s tripping you up.”

Sendak raised his hand again.  Shiro flinched automatically, head ducked to avoid the pain.  When he chanced a look up, Sendak’s hand hadn’t moved, and he smirked down at Shiro.

Hatred churned in Shiro’s stomach like a living thing.  It was seriously tempting to just rush Sendak, damn the consequences.

But Shiro needed to do two things right now.  First was to keep the Galra distracted from anyone else, and the second was to stay alive until Keith could get him.

Closing his eyes, Shiro took a deep breath and let it out just as slowly.

Patience.  He needed patience, and that would give him focus.

Shiro looked back up, eyes big and innocent.  “What was the question again?”

“What were you looking for,  _ Champion?” _ Sendak growled out, lips curling back around the name.

Ass.  Shiro clenched his jaw.  “Oh, that’s an easy one.  Bathroom.  This place is huge, so it’s really easy to get lost.  Can I get directions?”

Baring his teeth again, Sendak stepped back and nodded to one of the soldiers bracketing Shiro.  “Use it.”

Shiro tried to turn to see what was going on, but something pressed to the small of his back.  There was a faint buzz.  Shiro’s hair stood on end.  He remembered this.  It was-

Then the pain hit.

Shiro screamed.   Electricity rocked through him, making his muscles seize and twitch until he fell forward in a heap. He couldn’t think about Keith, couldn’t think about the rest of the mission, couldn’t think about mocking Sendak. 

The weapon pulled away, and Shiro sobbed against the cold floor, bangs falling forward.

Sendak’s boots stepped closer.  “You still scream the same, Champion,” Sendak told him, all dark satisfaction.

Shiro spat onto the floor.  The spit was faintly pink, and he couldn’t tell if he’d bit through his tongue or if that was from the reflected red lights of the room.

Any other time, Shiro would have a witty response, something he could reply so that Sendak didn’t win.  But he couldn’t find words anymore.  His whole body buzzed, his skin from the weapon and his mind from the memories, a disorienting mass of sensation and pain.

Shiro suspected it wasn’t just talk.  Sendak knew exactly how Shiro sounded when he screamed.  Shiro’s body remembered even when his mind didn’t.

“What did you seek, Champion?” Sendak asked, stepping forward again.  His boots stopped just inches from Shiro’s hands, an implied threat without any effort at all.  Shiro kept his fingers flat, refusing to give a sign he was intimidated.  “Was it for Voltron?”

Shit.  If Sendak knew what Shiro was looking for, the Galra would guard it closer.  If Keith was going to get the Red Lion, Shiro needed them thinking it was totally safe.

He had once chance of convincing Sendak it was.

Swallowing hard, he raised his wet, red face up to face Sendak.

Shiro’s expression was pure surprise.

“Voltron is here?” He breathed.  “But I thought it was on Ea-”  He cut off and bit his bottom lip, ducking his head again.

Was that too much?  It might have been too dramatic.  Shiro needed Sendak smug and focused until Keith had time to get the lion.

There was silence.  Shiro’s heart hammered, waiting for Sendak’s reaction.  Would he buy it?

Then, Sendak laughed.  “It was,” he said, his voice pure, dark satisfaction.  “We recovered it from the ruined wreckage of your planet.”

Shiro flinched, the image of Earth’s destruction all too real.  His heart pounded, and it took every trick he’d learned from being the Garrison’s golden boy to keep his face devastated.  “No.   _ No.” _

“Your planet and your primative people never stood a chance,” Sendak said.  “You may be the only one left at all.  The very last.”

Despite knowing the proof of the lie was hopefully getting to the Red Lion, Shiro shivered.  Just the thought made ice form in his stomach.

It was a reality the Alteans lived with every day.

Shiro swallowed against another sudden bout of guilt.  

“Normally I would end your pathetic species right now,” Sendak said.  “But that will come soon enough.  Who do you think will be willing to offer more for you, Champion?  The Arena or Haggar?”

All thoughts of stalling and lying left Shiro’s head in an instant of pure, brilliant terror.  He pushed up on his knees and started to turn, but the second he did, one of the guards reeled back their blaster and cracked him in the forehead.  Shiro went down hard, stunned.

Shiro’s ears rang so loudly he almost didn’t hear the distant crash.

Freezing, Sendak whirled in the direction of the noise.  “There was no other?”

“No, Commander,” the guard to Shiro’s right confirmed, though they sounded nervous about it.  “He was alone.  We searched the area.”

A screeching noise made all the Galra flinch.  The whole ship jolted and shook, rocking like a boat on a stormy sea.  Above them, the lights flickered.

“What’s going on?” Sendak demanded, this time into a comm.  “Report!”

There was no response.

The guards watched Sendak, and while Sendak glared at his communicator, Shiro looked around.  His helmet was held loosely in the leftmost soldier’s claws.

Excellent.

The ship rocked again, even more powerfully than before, and Shiro could have sworn the sound of rending metal sounded like a roar.  While the Galra recovered their balance, Shiro pushed off his feet and tackled the guard with his helmet.  They were completely unprepared, hitting the floor and losing their grip.  His helmet skittered away several feet, and came to a rest dome-side down.

Perfect.

Shiro didn’t bother with the soldier.  Instead, he ran after his helmet.  Crashing to his knees, he grabbed it with his hands, his grip awkward from the cuffs, then jammed it on quickly.  It was at a horrible angle, only letting him see half the screen and jamming his cheek against where his ear should be.

But it was on.

“Get hi-” Sendak was cut off by another noise, this time unmistakably a roar.  His remaining eyes flashed with fear and rage as he turned and ran in the other direction.  The guards cried out after him, but didn’t follow.  Instead, the right-side guard paused to help the other up.

Sendak reached the far doors just as the wall began to buckle and strain against the force of  _ something.  _

The metal gave like paper, and the head of a giant, mechanical lion peered through, roaring loud enough to make Shiro’s head ache, even through the helmet.

The air rushed in the room, pulled out toward the lion.  The depressurization pulled both guards off their feet and sent them tumbling across the floor.  Shiro’s knees slid as well, but he was just able to keep his balance.

Maybe it was crazy, but-

Shiro regained his feet, taking a moment to keep his balance between the fierce shove of the air and his lack of hands.

Then he started to run toward the lion.  Once he was within ten feet the tug of the void was too strong, threatening to yank him out into space.

So instead Shiro jumped for the lion.

The lion’s maw opened just in time, and Shiro tumbled inside, hitting the ground with a grunt.  The jaws snapped shut behind him.

Scrambling awkwardly on the floor, Shiro popped off his helmet, and then he looked around.

The room was all metal and filled with bright red lights.  It was dim compared to Earth ships, but much brighter than the Galra vessel had been.  There wasn’t much except storage, but the very back had a ramp that led up.

“Shiro?” Keith’s voice called, echoing in the small, metal space.  “You landed okay?”

“I’ve been better,” he admitted. “But I’ve been way worse.”  Smiling at the ramp, Shiro let out a wild laugh as he climbed back to his feet and made his way up.  “You did it!  I told you.”

The cockpit proper made Shiro’s breath catch.

It was beautiful.  The projected screens were almost dazzlingly bright, and the metal shone a pale silver.  Keith sat in the pilot’s seat, the shape streamlined and slick, perfectly matching his armor.  Like this, Shiro couldn’t find it silly-looking anymore, even with its ridiculously bright colors.

It looked like the uniform of someone powerful.

Shiro’s stomach twisted in both discomfort and sorrow.

There was so much of this that Shiro hated.  But he couldn’t deny it suited Keith well.

“Took you long enough,” Shiro greeted cheerfully, stepping over to look over the controls.  They were fascinating, and Shiro frankly didn’t understand what did what.  There were levers and pedals, but Keith didn’t seem to be using them much at all, even as the Red Lion turned in place, claws cutting through the metal of the ship like paper.  

Sentient.  Right.

Kinda weird, honestly.  But amazing to see in action like this.

Keith snorted and eyed him.  “Yeah, well, someone gave me shitty directions.  I had to wait for a giant cat to tell me how to get there.”

Beaming back, Shiro shrugged.  “Hey, I’m a pilot, not a navigator.”   He went back to investigating, utterly enchanted by every part of the lion.  

When he focused, Keith’s eyes were locked on his face.  Belated, Shiro realized that between Sendak’s backhand and the blaster to the head, not to mention the fighting before, he probably looked like a mess.

“You need help there?”  Keith nodded to the cuffs.

Frowning down at them, Shiro shrugged.  “I don’t have a key, and I doubt you’ve got one.  We’ll deal with it when we can.”  He nodded to the console.  “You contact the castle yet?”

“Not since getting you,” Keith replied.  He tapped a button on the screen, labeled in a language Shiro didn’t understand and he knew Keith didn’t either.  “I’ve got him.  We’re heading back now.  Where’s everyone else?”

There was a huge sigh of relief over the comms.  “Oh thank god you’re alright, Takashi,” Sam murmured.

Chest warm, Shiro smiled, nevermind that Sam couldn’t see it.  “Alright is a relative term,” he replied.  “But I’m in one piece, so there’s that.”

“Good to hear from you.  Next time, you remember that I’m always right,” Matt chimed in.  “Always.  Repeat after me, Oh Captain my Captain.”

“Never.”

Allura cleared her throat.  “We’re glad you’re alright, Captain,” she added, and managed to make the address and the sentiment both sincere.  Guilt reared its ugly head again, but Shiro swallowed it back.  Not now. “We’ll recall the other three now.  Report to the central hangar as quickly as you can.  Now that Sendak knows we’re here, we won’t be able to stay undetected for long.”

“Got it,” Keith replied.  “How’s the evacuation?”

“Not good,” Hunk groaned.  “At least most of them agreed to come once Allura spoke with them, but we can only fit about fifteen Balmerans in the lions at once, and even that’s pushing it.  Between the three of us... well, it’s not as much as we’d like.”

“We’re getting the kids off first,” Katie agreed.  “But it’ll be way faster if we can get the castle down here and cut out the middleman.”

Lance sighed.  “Agreed.  This isn’t what the lions are good for, really.  We should be out there kicking butt.”

“Well, you’ll get your chance for butt-kicking soon,” Shiro agreed.  “We’ll meet you all there.  Once you have Voltron out, Sendak will be way too busy to care about the castle.  Especially since he’s a little rattled right now.”  He beamed at Keith, who gave a small, pleased smile back.

“Good,” Allura replied, voice dark and fierce.  Shiro grinned before he remembered who was talking.  “Fly fast.”

“We don’t know any other way,” Shiro agreed.  “Just one request.”

“What’s that?” Lance asked.

“Can someone at the castle get, I don’t know, a really good pair of scissors or something?  I’d like out of these cuffs.”

***

Once back at the ship, Coran had some sort of mechanism that undid the locks in the cuffs.  Shiro felt like Coran was a bit rougher with his arms than necessary when he got him free, but it was a small price to pay.  And, well, Shiro had been mouthy before.  Some shortness was to be expected.

“Thanks,” Shiro murmured, rubbing his natural wrist to get the circulation going again.

Coran nodded, chin held high.  “It’s my duty as royal advisor,” he replied pointedly, with a heavy hint of ‘or else I wouldn’t have bothered.’

Fair enough.

With that, Shiro was left to his own devices with a handful of bandages and some sort of disinfectant.  Apparently the Alteans had pods or something for healing purposes, but Shiro really didn’t feel like it was necessary for a few bumps and bruises.  Besides, he’d prefer not to be unconscious and trapped in a tiny tube, thanks so much.

Once that was done, Shiro made his way to the command room.  He ignored the still fierce buzzing in his ear.  Once the Princess got the lion out, that would be that, and Shiro would wait for the coast to clear before making his great escape.  Stick around for his last goodbyes, grab Keith’s stuff, recover his poor  _ Swift Warning _ from the rubble and make their merry way out.

Or maybe not, now that Keith was bonded with that lion.  Remembering the image Keith had made, back straight and shoulders broad in his shining armor, Shiro’s chest tightened.

Maybe it would just be Shiro after all.

Well, return to form.  Somehow, Shiro always seemed to end up alone at the end of his missions .  Crews were temporary and that’s how he wanted it.  One job and done .

Walking into the command room, Shiro stepped over to Matt and Sam, giving them a little wave and finger waggle.  “How’s it going?”

Matt turned, his expression was unusually flat.  “Look for yourself.”

Following Matt’s nod, Shiro’s eyes locked onto a screen.  On it, Shiro could see the four smaller lions, clustered around the opened door to the central anger.  There was a tiny dot that had to be Allura.

The Black Lion wasn’t responding to her.

The buzzing in Shiro’s ears grew louder, persistent, until it was almost painful.

“No,” he breathed.  “C’mon.  You  _ have _ to.”

Allura had said that the lion’s bond could not be forced.  That they picked their paladins, and that was it.

But there had to be exceptions.  There had to be a glass box that said ‘in case of imminent death, break glass’.  If the lions were sentient, they had to know that they were about to be captured by the Galra, and what that meant.

Around them, the screens flashed red and an alarm blared. Sam tensed hard, and Shiro absently reached out to put a hand on his shoulder, helping to steady him.  

Coran bent over a console, more screens blooming under his fingers.  “The Galra ships are approaching!  Sendak’s ship is charging its ion cannon!”

_ No. _  They weren’t ready.

But time was up.

Allura groaned, an utterly frustrated noise.  “Paladins, head out.”

“But we don’t have Voltron!” Hunk protested.  “We can’t-” He swallowed hard.  “Can we fight this?”

“We can,” Keith said, voice steady.  “Because we have to.  There’s no other choice.”

Shiro half expected the others to protest that, but it was enough.  All the lions but the black one started to move, turning around and heading for the hangar door.

Next to Shiro, Matt took a deep breath like he was about to protest, but Shiro reached out and grabbed onto his upper arm, tugging until he stopped.  Looking back at Shiro, Matt gave a dark frown, but didn’t speak.

The four had to fight.  There were so many lives on the line.  Themselves, the Balmerans on board, the Balmera itself.  There was no choice but to dig in their heels and meet Sendak halfway.  Even if Matt wanted to spare his sister that.

“Allura, we need you up here,” Coran called, his fingers flying over the screens.  The shields visibly brightened around the ship as power redirected to them.

There was a distant flash, and then something  _ hit. _

The ship bucked wildly against the strike, nearly sending Shiro crashing into Matt.  Sam had to use his cane to keep upright.  Coran, on the other hand, rocked with the movement without any difficulty.

“Oh my way,” Allura replied.  “I need to speak with Captain first.”

Frowning, Matt looked at Shiro again, brow furrowed, asking ‘why?’ without words.

Ignoring that, Shiro leaned toward the console.  “No.”

“You  _ will _ speak with me,” Allura snapped.  After a moment, she let out a sigh.  “Please.  Just to talk.”

Chewing on the inside of his lip, Shiro considered.  He knew what she was going to say, and he didn’t want to hear it.

But after the shit he’d given her, Shiro owed Allura at least a chance to speak.  

“Alright,” he agreed, biting back a sigh of his own.  “Just a few moments.  I’ll meet you outside the command room.”

“Understood,” Allura replied, then went quiet.

Now, Matt’s brows were up to his hairline.  “Okay, what’s this about?”

But Sam’s expression was far too knowing.  He looked Shiro over, then offered a smile.  “Takashi.  Do you remember the advice I gave you, a few days before we left for the mission?”

Shiro’s heart clenched.  He ducked his head, looking down at his feet rather than keep meeting Sam’s eyes.  “Yeah.  I remember.”

_ If you’re too worried about what could go wrong, you might miss the chance to do something great. _

At the time, Shiro had been terrified of the mission.  It had hit all at once that he was responsible for the lives of the Holts, for getting all this equipment and these people safely to the far end of the solar system.

Now...

Now he was terrified again.  But this time he wasn’t afraid of himself.  This time he was flinching from held out hands like they were raised to strike him.

Considering how many scars marred Shiro’s skin?  He had good reason to think that.

“I understand,” Shiro replied softly.

Sam didn’t say anything else.  He nodded and tapped his cane against the floor, looking grim but satisfied.  “Go on, son.  Decide what you need to do.”

Shiro’s jaw worked as he figured out what to say to that.  In the end he simply nodded.

After all, there was one authority figure who had yet to let him down.  A lone good example in years of pain and torture and betrayal.

With that, Shiro turned and stepped out of the room, waiting for Allura.

He only waited a couple of minutes before her footsteps clacked down the hall.  Allura stepped up to him and put her hands on her hips, lips pressed thin.  “I can’t say I understand it,” she told him, voice clipped.

Shiro had to grin at that, even if it was a bitter expression.  “Me either.”

Allura shook her head.  “The lion has chosen you.  There’s nothing else to be done.  It  _ must _ be you.”

“I can’t,” Shiro told her, hands clenched tightly at his side.

Lips pulling back into a snarl, Allura snorted.  “You won’t.  Because you are afraid.  Because you would rather run from this.”

“Because I tried this before,” Shiro admitted, voice low and rough.  “Because I gave myself, heart and soul, to an organization.  And they decided their pride was more important than my freedom and the lives on our planet.  I will not do that again.”

Allura’s eyes narrowed.  “You are not the only one who has been betrayed,” she hissed at him, ears angling back.  “You are not the only one who’s life has been ruined by  treachery, who believed in a system and had it wreck their lives.  Yo ur planet survived it.  Mine did not.  Yet I do not  _ run _ from the chance to do good.”

Bristling, Shiro stepped in closer.  “Don’t you?” he shot back.  “You chose to run from Arus.  You chose to run for the months since you woke up, over and over.  Don’t you dare lecture me about running,  _ Princess. _  While you hid?  We were out there doing actual good.  It was small, but it was standing up to the Galra.”

Allura leaned back, eyes flashing.  But then she let out a slow breath.  “You’re right,” she said, though her tone was low and heated.  “We were running.  And we proved it was a bad idea, over and over.  But now there’s the chance to fight, and you turn up your nose at it.  For what?  What do you fear?”

What did he fear?

Shiro feared losing himself again. He feared being made into a fighter for a cause he didn’t believe in.  He feared being controlled by royal masters taking away pieces of him, both literal and figurative.  He feared believing in an organization only to have that belief turn to ash in his mouth.

Shiro feared to trust.

“This is all moot,” Allura finally said, eyes closed tightly in frustration.  “Right now?  The paladins are out there fighting a battle they have no expectation of being able to win.  The individual lions don’t have the power to fight off a fleet by themselves, not in such inexperienced hands.  They need Voltron.  If you run, you damn their lives.  You seem to care about them.  If nothing else, do this, then leave after.  You’ll have earned that.  But if you give a  _ damn _ about them, you’ll get to the lion.”

The logic of that hit like a punch to the gut.

Shiro searched over Allura’s face, looking for the trap.  There was fine print in here somewhere, the way to ensnare him and make him an object.

Except he didn’t see it.

Hell, Shiro had gone into this stupid argument already half agreeing.  

Goddamn Sam.

There was only one answer here.

“Yes,” Shiro whispered, forcing the words out.  “Okay.  Just this once.”

Allura relaxed at that, nodding.  “Then go.”

Swallowing hard, Shiro nodded back.  “Yes, Princess.”  It came out without any sarcasm, despite Shiro’s best efforts.  “We have a lot in common, I think.”

“Unfortunately,” Allura replied.  A hint of a smile played at her lips.

Nodding, Shiro turned down the hall and ran.

***

The Black Lion loomed in its hangar.

The buzzing stopped before Shiro even got close to this room.  Once he’d agreed to do this, that was enough.

So Shiro was left staring up at the huge mechanical beast in awe.

Shiro had seen the Blue Lion from a distance, and seen how large the Red Lion’s head was.

He’d never stood at their feet and looked up like this.

“I don’t know why you picked me,” he said.  “I think you’re wrong.  But I want to protect them.  So I’ll listen.”

The Black Lion  _ roared. _

Then, slowly, the great head lowered to the ground, and the mouth opened to him.

Shiro took a deep breath and stepped forward.

Inside, the cockpit lit up, purple and black where the other lion had been red.  It should have been uncomfortable like the Galra ships, but it had the same sleek beauty as Red.

Sitting down in the seat, Shiro reached out.  He paused just over the levers, his hand shaking violently.

Shiro could say it was just this once as many times as he wanted.  But he knew this would change him.  He knew that giving an inch was the same as giving a mile.

There was no choice.  Not while the others fought to save all their lives.  Not when the paladins  would die if he didn’t do this.  Not when all those Balmerans and the huge, gorgeous Balmera itself needed someone to step up.

Shiro gripped the levers.

Images and feelings flooded his mind.

He saw the completed form of Voltron, huge and powerful.  He saw the other lions just moments ago, reunited with Black for the first time in ten thousand years.  He saw his own past, the snippets he remembered of gladiator fights and his return home.

Disgust and anger rose in Shiro for how he’d been hurt.

There was an answering swell of emotions, exactly matching his own.

Whatever had happened to the Black Lion in the past, they had been bodily used.  They had been forced to fight and was left scarred, psychically if not physically.

For one brief moment, Shiro and Black felt the exact same thing.

_ We will not be used.  We will not be controlled.  We will not run anymore. _

In another universe, Allura would have made a wonderful Black Paladin.  But she was not the one who matched Black best right now.

Hands tightening around the controls, Shiro rocked forward.  The lion shot up, bursting past the hangar and out into open space.

Around them, the battle ranged.  Shots bounced off the castle’s shields, and Black’s memories showed him what the barrier should have looked like.  It was refreshed from the new crystal, but weakened from so much fire.  Just past that were the other four lions, cutting through jets and ships and dodging fire.

But they were deeply outnumbered.

“The Black Lion!” Katie called.  “Allura, you got it to work?”

Unable to help it, Shiro smiled.  “Should I put on a voice and pretend?”

“Captain!” Lance called, sounding honestly delighted.

Shiro winced at the address.  “Shiro is fine.”

“Good to have you, Captain,” Keith replied, and Shiro could just  _ see _ his smirk, the little shit.

As if reacting to his thoughts, the screen showed a feed from inside the Red Lion.  Keith was wearing the exact smug smirk that Shiro had imagined.

Of course.

Well, the name they called him was a problem for another time.  For now, Sendak’s ship was charging another ion cannon blast.  “You four look like you could use a little more firepower,” Shiro said, flying the Black Lion over to float in the center of the group.  “I don’t know that any of us actually know what we’re doing but... if we’re going to go down in this fight, let’s give them something to remember us by.”

“Aye aye, Captain,” Lance replied.

“Let’s do this.” Hunk.

“We’ll rip them to shreds.”  Katie- or maybe Pidge.

“Yes, Sir.” Keith.

Shiro smiled.  It was his vicious, nasty smile, matched by the Black Lion’s furious determination.

“Form Voltron.”

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed this, come find more at [my tumblr!](bosstoaster.tumblr.com/).


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